by Christy Maskeroni, MS RD
As Summer approaches, many of us are frantically trying to get ready for Beach Season. Whether you are a self-motivated health nut, or a newly-motivated convert, now is a great time to kick-start your health. You may be thinking you are in need of those no-real-food juice cleanses or the say-no-to-carbohdyrate diet to get you back on track or detoxify your body of all that excess it tends to store. What if I told you that just eating from a variety of real foods and food groups could have you on your way to achieving your fitness goals. Sounds too good to be true?
After the mindless eating and drinking that many of us engage in, your body may be in need of a detox. What exactly is a detox? It is the removal of harmful substances such as poison or toxins from the body.
Every one of our bodies detoxifies on its own. Whether you are working, running after the kids, or meeting friends for dinner, your body is taking care of you. However, as you are moving through your busy routine, you are also surrounded by many harmful toxic materials.
Toxic substances can be in the water we drink, the air we breath, the clothes we wear, the food we eat, the alcohol we sip, the cleaning supplies we use, the deoderant or make-up we use…you get the picture. Your body absorbs these harmful substances, but this is partly why you have those wonderful organs in your abdominal region. Your liver, kidneys, colon, gallbladder, blood, and skin all play a part to help get rid of these toxins. Some of the materials will easily be excreted and cause no harm. However, others can accumulate in your cell membranes and fat cells and create a build-up which can cause mild reactions (headaches, fatigue, allergies, rashes, muscle pain, mental confusion) to more severe problems (autoimmune diseases, hormonal imbalances, nutritional deficiencies, cancer). Basically, the longer you expose yourselves to these toxins, the greater the damage. So what can you do?
Quality food is one solution. You can assist your body in its own detoxification processes by eating a varied, nutrient-dense, fiber rich, balanced diet. We may be feeling the effects of our over indulgence due to a poor-quality or restricted diet that lacks the essential vitamins and minerals. However, you can easily change that pattern by following these easy 10 steps:
10 steps to assist your body in its own natural detoxification process.
1. Increase fiber consumption. This helps move toxins through the body by adding bulk to your stool for elimination. This includes fruits, vegetables, beans, legumes, and whole grains (brown/black/wild rice, quinoa, whole wheat couscous, whole wheat breads, etc.)
2. Drink more water. This too assists in the movement of material through the digestive system as well as through the kidneys for elimination.
3. Eat more fruits and vegetables. These offer fiber and several vitamins and minerals that assist in the detoxification process and removal of free radicals from the body. Choose organic as often as possible and avoid those that have been waxed, sprayed, dyed, or fumigated.
4. Get more sleep. Your body does most it’s rest, repair and recovery at night. Lack of sleep has been shown to cause hormonal imbalance leading to numerous problems including diabetes and obesity. More sleep can help control hunger levels, cravings, mood and anxiety.
5. Decrease additives and preservatives. Examples of this include MSG, nitrates, nitrites, BHA, and BHT. These are toxins that can begin to build in the cell membrane and lead to problems.
6. Eat less refined carbohydrates/sugars. This includes white breads, cookies, cakes, candies, sugar, white pasta, etc. Refined carbohydrates lack the necessary nutrients that your body needs to assist in the detoxification process.
7. Reduce the fat in your diet, especially saturated fat. A high fat diet has been known to increase your risk for disease.
8. Reduce your stress levels. The accumulation of stress in the body can throw the body’s natural function off. This can eventually cause an imbalance and lead to a multitude of problems. Yoga, meditation, journaling, and exercise are a few effective ways to reduce stress levels.
9. Drink less caffeine. Too much caffeine can disrupt liver and endocrine function as well as many other functions in the body.
10. Reduce your alcohol consumption. Alcohol is high in calories and has little nutritional value. Drinking alcohol produces a toxin as it is metabolized in the liver and can deplete several vitamins and minerals in the body.
Many of these ideas might seem obvious but the truth is, they work! Food is your fuel. If you know your car runs most efficiently on premium gas, then that is what you put it in the tank. It is the same thing with food. When you feed your body the food it needs, you will be amazed at how much better you run and feel.
Where should you start? Here are a few foods that are very beneficial in helping you reach your body’s full potential.
- Yellow, red, green vegetables like peppers, spinach, collard greens, swiss chard & kale
- Lean proteins like chicken, seafood, eggs
- Fruits like raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, tomatoes, bananas, grapefruits, lemons
- Beans and legumes like peas, lentils, and soybeans (edamame)
- Nuts and seeds like pumpkin seeds, black currant seeds, brazil nuts, walnuts, and almonds
- Avocados
- Whole grains like brown/black rice and quinoa
- Sea vegetables like hijiki, arame, seaweed
- Cabbage and brussel sprouts
- Wheat grass, spirulina, chlorella
- Oils like flaxseed, primrose, fish oil, and olive oil
- Milk thistle
- Sweet potatoes and potatoes
- Burdock root
- Garlic and onions
Christy Maskeroni is the Director of Nutrition at CLAY Health Club & Spa as well as a Master Trainer and Yoga Instructor (RYT-200). She holds a Master of Science in Nutrition and Applied Physiology from Columbia University, Teachers College and is a Certified Personal Trainer through NASM. For more information on Christy and her nutrition services visit www.insideclay.com/nutrition or follow her fun tips on Twitter @cmaskeroni
Let’s be honest. Our moms told us to do it; our teachers told us to do it; and now nutritionists everywhere are telling us to do it:
Eat more fruits and vegetables, it’s good for you!
Some experts tell us to eat 9 servings of fruits and vegetables every day, but unless you’re vegan or vegetarian, most of us don’t come close. With our eating-on-the-run, take-out food and dining-out culture, how are we ever going to come close to making mom happy? Well, one quick-and-easy solution is juicing.
Juicing is a convenient way to get the vitamins and minerals that our bodies need every day and it has innumerable health benefits, including:
- Keeping you trim
- Detox and cleansing
- Anti-aging and longevity
- Disease prevention & treatment
- Healthier hair, skin and nails
There are two basic ways that most people juice: make your own juice at home or buy fresh pressed juices. Making your own juice can be fun and it’s probably more affordable. After you buy a juicer such as the Breville or Jack LaLanne (be wary of the plastic juicers – they tend to break easily), you’re ready to go shopping for your fruits and veggies. Remember, when you make your own juice, they say it’s best to drink it immediately, so only make as much as you can drink in one sitting.
NYC’s Greenmarkets are a wonderful place to get started because they are located in so many neighborhoods throughout NYC and they feature a wide variety of local farmers. GrowNYC operates 54 Greenmarkets in NYC including the world-famous Union Square Greenmarket; Community Markets operates 6 Greenmarkets in NYC.
When you get to the Greenmarket, look for green leafy vegetables, carrots, beets, broccoli and any fruit because these are detox foods.
If you’re like me and often too lazy to make your own juice, there are now plenty of great stores and cafes that sell fresh-pressed juices including: Dig Inn, Juice Generation, The Juice Press, Lifethyme, Natural Frontier Market, Organic Avenue, Park Natural Foods, Sunac Natural Market, Sun in Bloom and Westerly Market. You can expect to pay $8 – $10 for the real deal at most of these spots. It’s not cheap, but it’s GOOOOOD.
So, whether you make your own juice or purchase a fresh-pressed juice, your body will say “Thank you!” and your mom will say “I told you so!”
Happy Juicing!
So, they say that oatmeal is like, the only great breakfast out there, huh?
I’m hearing that a daily of a bowl of oatmeal may:
- lower blood cholesterol
- reduce the risk of heart disease
- assist with weight loss
BUT, is all oatmeal the same?
Where is the best oatmeal in the city?
What if I want a quick and low-sugar oatmeal to grab on the go?
To clarify: we hear that the daily consumption of a bowl of oatmeal can lower blood cholesterol and may reduce the risk of heart disease when combined with a low-fat diet. It may also assist with weight loss because a high-fiber diet tends to make a meal feel larger and longer, so you stay full for a greater amount of time.
And, all oatmeal is not the same. It’s good to know exactly what you’re getting into. For example, according to Mark Bittman, McDonald’s oatmeal has as much sugar as a Snicker’s bar and more calories than a McDonald’s hamburger. Likewise, Pret A Manger’s oatmeal has 590 calories.
So, where can you find the low calorie, affordable and tasty oatmeal in NYC? Cosi’s (222 calories, $3.26), Fresh & Co (214 calories, $3.25 plus toppings), Dig Inn ($3.67) and Europa Café ($2.65, 390 calories) are all good options, but our favorite is Whole Foods whose oatmeal has 150 calories according to LiveStrong, costs $1.99 and includes unlimited toppings.
Another tasty, convenient, healthy alternative (and a big fave in our office) is Vigilant Eats, an organic, superfood, gluten-free and vegan oat-based breakfast cereal. Each cup comes with a spoon tucked inside the lid (how cool is that?) and you just add water or milk, stir and eat. It’s that easy and super yummy. It’s a perfect healthy breakfast for people on the go who don’t have time for a sit-down meal. You can purchase this cereal at Westerly Market, Organic Avenue, Foodtrainers and the NY Open Center.
So, what’s your favorite oatmeal?
I have below a Q&A with Morgan Mclellan who as a journalist living in Toronto completed my BuiltLean Program with some impressive results. Despite having a busy job and being completely out-of-shape when he started, Morgan lost over 20lb of fat in only 8 short weeks.
As Morgan completed the program, we exchanged some emails to help him get the most out of the program. The before/after photos speak for themselves. To learn more about Morgan and his insights into successful body transformation, check out the Q&A below.
from YogaCityNYC
A few weeks ago, a new blog popped up on the yoga scene and it was clear, right from the start, that it wasn’t constructed to put more positive vibes into our world. In fact, The Aghori Babarrazi, as they call themselves, were sharp, cutting and, in the process, making some people a little crazy. They were also, undeniably smart.
from YogaCityNYC
Recently, a bunch of new classes geared towards yoga teachers have begun to permeate the New York City scene. These classes vary in their format, but all seek to bring teachers and serious practitioners together to learn, grow and become students again of this vast and diverse practice.
YogaCity NYC’s Alex Phelan sat down with Alison West of Yoga Union, Jennifer Brilliant of Jennifer Brilliant Yoga, Dana Flynn of Laughing Lotus and Nikki Costello from Kula Yoga Project to discuss the ins and outs of their teachers classes.
from YogaCityNYC
Joe Young doesn’t often say much in class, but when he does it’s delivered with a calm confidence. To begin, he had us take three long inhales and exhales before tuning in with the Adi mantra, “Ong Namo Guru Dev Namo.”
There was a short warm-up to prepare us for the three-part healing meditation that was to come. First, we took our hands to our knees and undulated through spinal flexes which brought openness into the middle back. And then we did rapid rounds shoulder shrugs to further open the upper back and loosen up.
from YogaCityNYC
There’s something special about studying at Integral Yoga Institute. Maybe it’s the legacy: the organization has served the NYC yoga community with – well, integrity – since 1966, way before yoga’s rise to trendiness.
Molly Heron entered the room with deep eyes, kind smile. Her class included all the hallmarks of the Integral Yoga approach with her own personal twist (pun intended!). We began class with eye exercises: first circling, then rubbing palms together and cupping them with warmth and energy.
Photo: Ben Fried
As first documented by @noahbudnick, the section of the Prospect Park loop south of the lake has had new markings (and a smooth, fresh surface) for a few weeks. On this section you can experience the more spacious 24/7 accommodations for walkers, joggers, and cyclists that will soon expand to the rest of the loop. I was over there about two weeks ago and it was kind of remarkable to see everyone using the lane designated specifically for them.
According to electronic message boards stationed in the park, the rest of the loop will get new markings starting on May 11 (word is new pavement is not in the works). Now about that rush-hour car lane…
Photo: waywardcourier/Flickr
Metro areas in the Northeast were found to have the highest "test-score gaps," a measure of educational inequality. Brookings found this was linked to economic segregation reinforced by large lot zoning in suburban jurisdictions. Image: Brookings
What do laws that mandate large yards and prevent walkable development have to do with educational opportunity? Turns out, there’s an important connection.
The Brookings Institution recently examined educational inequality across the U.S. by race and income. One of the key findings was that large-lot zoning requirements effectively restrict access to quality education for low-income children, hindering their long-term economic prospects.
Restrictive zoning laws are widespread. Brookings reports that 84 percent of municipalities impose some minimum lot size, the average being 0.4 acres. The authors note that this is larger than the average lot size of a single-family home in America — 0.26 acres. In other words, in most places it’s illegal just to build a home of typical size.
The authors report that these laws “effectively block low-income students and their families from living near or attending” public schools where students perform well on state exams. In areas with large lot laws, it is significantly more expensive to live near good public schools than it is in areas without restrictive zoning, according to the study.
This in turn has a significant effect on educational attainment and economic opportunity. Low-income students who attend top schools score two percent higher than state averages, according to Brookings. Low-income students attending low-performing schools score 18.5 percent below average.
The authors believe their research points to the inadequacy of education reforms like school vouchers or merit pay for teachers:
All of these reform strategies have one thing in common: They try to improve disadvantaged students’ access to high-performing schools through education policy. These reform ideas certainly have merit and should be carefully evaluated and considered, but they do not address one very important mechanism that sorts poor students into the lowest-scoring schools: housing policy. Housing and education policies should work together to promote access to improved school environments for low-income and minority children.
The most ambitious and consequential policy reform along these lines would be to eliminate exclusionary zoning altogether. In an ideal world, the federal government or states would forbid local governments from discriminating based on housing type (e.g. single-family attached or multi-family) or size (lot, floor, or frontage size). They could even agree to compensate jurisdictions for any disproportionate increases in local expenditures that resulted from higher density or lower-income development. Eliminating exclusionary zoning laws could produce large educational and economic benefits for low-income and minority children and families, and the U.S. economy as a whole. Unfortunately, the likelihood of such a reform, however market-oriented it may be, seems low at this time.
Barring such sweeping policy reforms, the authors point to regional or local housing and land use policies that could have an impact on improving educational equality, such as inclusionary zoning (compelling developments to include a certain percentage of low-income units) and focusing dense development near existing job centers and transit lines.
Yoga Local NYC:
