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jennsmidlifecrisis

jennsmidlifecrisis

Tag Archives: health

What’s the Skinny…

17 Monday Feb 2020

Posted by jennsmidlifecrisis in Food, Foolishness

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

#whatsinmycup, health, tea, what's in my cup


With that holiday between Christmas chocolate and Easter chocolate over, it’s time to refocus on those New Year’s resolutions. Plus sweatshirt season won’t last forever.

I love sweatshirt season. Am I wearing a bra? Who knows! Am I wearing what I wore to bed under it? Maybe.

So what if a cup of tea could melt your fat away, boost your energy, make you look like a supermodel? Oh, if it were only that easy, I could wear anything I wanted…without causing a traffic accident or traumatizing the neighbourhood children.

It’s been marketed by different names: flat belly tea, slim tea, skinny tea, fit tea. They can be sold in kits, with one of more teas to be taken daily over a period of time. The marketers are geniuses, using celebrities and skinny “bunnies” with great abs wearing postage stamp yoga wear to sell promises: lose weight, burn calories, boost metabolism, suppress appetite, increase energy, cleanse and detoxify…like most things, if it seems too good to be true, it probably is!

Most of these products allege that they can detoxify the body from toxins you accumulate through food, the environment, you name it! But our bodies were created with systems to deal with pollutants, and a healthy body simply doesn’t need more help.

The “quick-fix” mentality may also encourage bad eating habits, like fasting or shying away from nutrient-rich foods, which end up weakening the body.

While many of these teas contain natural ingredients, frequently there is not enough information to determine whether they are in fact effective. Others have been proven to make no difference. The tea component contains flavonoids, antioxidants, and some level of caffeine. All of these are conducive to weight loss, and may help reduce inflammation and digestive upsets, but let’s be honest, on their own, without proper diet and exercise (and sometimes even with), they aren’t miracle workers. Drinking any type of tea increases water intake, which flushes out excess salt and retained water, and fills you up so you snack less. It’s also a great option to high calorie beverages like soda or beer, but water is one of the best, easiest and least expensive ways to shed a few ounces. I like my water with tea leaves, please!

skinny tea_ed

So if the promises aren’t true, why are they allowed to market this way? Skinny teas are considered dietary supplements and therefore are not subject to the same standards that require them to prove their claims. 

Now do you feel cheated, used, and abused? Me too. I’ve always been skeptical of the whole “slim tea” bandwagon, but once again, as with most things, if it sounds too good to be true, it may not be true.

Look, I can’t make everyone happy. I’m not bacon! Live in the moment – drink tea!

Happy Monday!

Red Rooibos

12 Monday Feb 2018

Posted by jennsmidlifecrisis in Food

≈ 17 Comments

Tags

#whatsinmycup, health, tea


I’m seeing red a lot these days.

It might be because life is a little overwhelming and filled with stupid people.

Or because my hormones are raging like a hangry toddler in a candy store.

Or most likely, because Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and I just want to shout, “Bah Humbug”!

Good thing I keep my tea chest stocked with Rooibos Tea. Rooibos tea is an herb that comes from an evergreen South African shrub from the legume family. Sometimes it’s called Red Bush tea, and it is only grown in the mountainous regions South Africa, just north of Cape Town. Rooibos tea is red in colour and has a sweet, earthy flavour similar to black tea, and is prepared in the same way. Not all red teas are Rooibos teas. There is no caffeine and fresh leaves are high in Vitamin C.

Generally the leaves undergo an oxidation process, much like black tea leaves. As the leaves dry, chlorophyll in the leaves breaks downs and tannins are released. Tannins are responsible for the slightly bitter taste in tea.

My personal favourite is Tetley’s Red Vanilla Rooibos, but Day 13 of  my office tea parties (Day 1-4) (5-10), is a new favourite. You’ll have to wait until next Monday to read all about it!

Red Vanilla.jpg

Red shoes. Red lipstick. Red hair. Red tea.
Always classy, never trashy, and a little bit sassy!

There is a shade of red for every woman. – Audrey Hepburn

Happy Monday!

Lemon Ginger Tea

20 Monday Nov 2017

Posted by jennsmidlifecrisis in Food

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

#whatsinmycup, food, health, tea


Last week I baked a dozen brownies, 2 dozen coconut lime muffins, and an endless pile of Christmas-shaped cookies, with icing and sprinkles, for the volunteers collecting boxes for Samaritan’s Purse Operation Christmas Child program. I sampled one of each!

Cookies

It’s no surprise that Saturday morning, I felt tired and achy.  A few hours and laundry loads later, I felt even worse. In fact, I felt so crummy I didn’t want my usual cup of tea!

Shock and horror! I must be getting sick!

I rooted in the cupboard for lemon tea. The first sachet I seized upon, in it’s buttered popcorn wrapper, was Stash Lemon Ginger tea.  It wasn’t until I started researching this post that I found out, this was a smart move. In addition to the benefits of Vitamin C on your immune system, lemon ginger tea is good for nausea, headaches and the common cold. Ginger is high in zinc which play a key role in producing and secreting insulin. Combined with anti-oxidants found in lemon ginger tea, this is a good hot beverage for diabetics. It can help with weight loss by balancing sugar levels and cravings for carbs, as well as boosting your metabolism to burn more calories. It’s great for your skin and hair! And, well you can read more at Stylecraze.com.

The colour is a light honey brown and the aroma is slightly perfume-y with a hint of lemon. As for taste, I think Stash’s review of its product is bang on – “an interesting blend of ginger root, lemongrass, lemon flavor, safflower, hibiscus and citric acid…. It combines the puckery taste of lemon with the sharp, lingering bite of ginger, making it a great sipping drink”.

Lemon Ginger 2 (800x469)

Oh – and one more benefit! It also reduces heartburn and indigestion when you’ve eaten too many Christmas cookies. Which I did not. This time.

Happy Monday!

Green Tea (& Chocolate)

30 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by jennsmidlifecrisis in Food

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

#whatsinmycup, food, health, tea


Drinking a cup of green tea, I stopped a war. – Paul Reps

Paul Reps was an American artist, poet, and author, best known for his unorthodox haiku-inspired poetry. And apparently, a green tea drinker.

Green tea was first popular in China, but quickly spread throughout Asia. Now it is one of the most popular types of tea consumed in North America. For centuries it was used for medicinal purposes, from headaches to depression beneficial properties continue to be acclaimed.

Green and black tea leaves come from the Camelia sinensis plant, but how the leaves are treated once harvested makes the difference. For green tea, mature leaves are pan fired or steamed, then quickly oven dried to avoid oxidization and retain fresh flavour. It can be served on its own or blended with other organic materials, such as fruits, nuts or other leaves. Green tea leaves plucked in morning can be steeped by evening.

Green Tea

Top: Organic Spice is Right / Left: Organic Japanese Sencha / Right: Organic Detox, David’s Tea

Green tea is sugar free and low in caffeine. Most tea brands list it as 25 mg per 8 fl. oz. Some studies have shown that green tea can increase the metabolic rate, (burning more fat), in the short term, and it may kill bacteria and inhibit some viruses, improving health overall. Green tea is also high in the amino acid, theonine (which we learned about last week), can have a calming effect on an individual. Other health benefits attributed to green tea including improved brain function, lower risk of cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes, and a lower risk of certain types of cancer.

I meant to get this posted earlier in the day, but as I was concluding some research (past my bedtime), I discovered another side to green tea that I want to experiment with and report back on in a month or two. And that, my friends, is the “Beauty Benefits” of green tea for hair and skin. So far, I’ve purchased 72 pure green tea bags and a carton of yogurt when I went grocery shopping. I figure, if this is a complete disaster, I can either:

a) experiment with cooking with green tea; or,

b) use the yogurt to bake some more coconut lime muffins (apparently they’re so good, I’m getting requests)!

I wonder if green tea infused chocolates have the benefits of chocolate and the benefits of green tea?

Green tea Chocolate 2

 

Chocolate – it’s cheaper than therapy and you don’t need an appointment.

It’s time to put the kettle on – put yours on too, and we can share a cup together! Cheers!

 

 

Random Acts of Coffee

31 Wednesday Jul 2013

Posted by jennsmidlifecrisis in Food, Foolishness

≈ 16 Comments

Tags

coffee, family, food, health, kindness


A random act of kindness is a selfless act performed by a person or people wishing to either assist or cheer up an individual person or people – Source: Wikipedia

According to Michelle Robichaud, the Tim Horton’s spokesperson, it’s not an ingenious marketing scheme but a sincere and random act of coffee kindness that has spawned caffeine copy-cats across Canada.

It started on Monday, July 22 in Edmonton, Alberta, when a 20-something man walked in to a Tim Horton’s, ordered a large double-double and a Boston cream doughnut, then asked the cashier to add 500 large coffees for the next customers to his bill. His bill was over $800 and no one knows why he did it! It took Tim’s until 8:00 a.m. the following morning to fill that order. Within a day or two, another gentleman in Calgary, Alberta, ordered 500 medium coffees for the next 500 customers. On Thursday, a soon-to-retire bus driver entered an Ottawa, Ontario Tim’s and ordered 500 coffees, which were filled in less than an hour. By Saturday, the random acts of coffee had visited St. John’s, Newfoundland with the purchase of 120 Tim gift cards for the next 120 guests. By 6:00 p.m. last night, Tim Horton’s across Canada reported 29 separate incidents of large orders in a “pay it forward” motion.

Coffee lovers have other reasons to smile. A recent Harvard study revealed that people who drank 2-4 cups of caffeinated coffee a day (the equivalent of about 400 mg of caffeine) had a 50 per cent lower risk of suicide because the caffeine in coffee may act as a mild anti-depressant and increase neurotransmitters like serotonin, dopamine and noradrenalin. In other studies, coffee has been linked to the reduced likely hood of type 2 diabetes, Parkinson’s disease, and dementia, and has been known to reduce the likelihood of other serious medical conditions.

If you’re a coffee drinker, go sip to that! And if the spirit moves you, go share a random act of coffee!

Have a Great Day!

Resources:

http://ca.shine.yahoo.com/blogs/healthy-living/spill-beans-5-myths-coffee-debunked-212000234.html
http://ca.shine.yahoo.com/blogs/shine-on/harvard-study-links-coffee-reduced-suicide-risk-190349574.html
http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/caffeine-copycat-500-free-coffees-given-away-in-ottawa-calgary-edmonton-1.1383473#ixzz2aZwehJPe
http://www.vocm.com/newsarticle.asp?mn=2&id=36869&latest=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Random_act_of_kindness

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