Wisdom Wednesday!!

Sugar Addiction

I've talked a lot about sugar. Last week I talked about your blood sugar. I've talked about refined sugar substitutes. On my first Wisdom Wednesday post I talked about the process of refined sugar and then went on to talk about the chemical reaction that sugar has on your brain that makes it addictive. To refresh your memory on that click here. So when I saw this article giving 10 tactics for overcoming your sugar addiction I thought I would touch on the subject again. I really liked his approaches. The only thing that I would change to his article or add to it would be this: when you are trying to get off refined sugars your body can go through withdrawals. I know that sounds funny because you're thinking it's only sugar. But remember it causes a chemical reaction in your brain so your body will crave it. So when you start to get the shakes and your cravings get really intense, grab some protein. The protein will help your body to calm down and your cravings will go away. So remember when you remove sugar from your diet replace it with healthy foods and lots of protein. For the rest of the 10 tactic for overcoming your sugar addiction go here.

Wisdom Wednesday!!

Blood Sugar

Last month on the Today show they had a segment on blood sugar and how it effects your body and your mood. They were not talking about Diabetics. They were talking about everyone. It really is amazing how much blood sugar effects your body and your mood.
To start off with today I wanted to talk about what blood sugar is. It actually is called glucose. Your body gets glucose from the food that you eat. Not just from the sugar you eat but every food that goes into your body. Your body breaks it down and makes glucose out of it. Some foods it takes your body longer to break down than others. Remember we talked a little bit about gylcemic index? The gylcemic index is a way of measuring how quickly your body breaks down the food into glucose and is absorbed into your bloodstream. Glucose is carried to each of your cells though your bloodstream. Glucose helps your cells to grow and gives them energy. So it's important to your body.
If your blood sugar is too high or too low for long periods of time, it can cause your body harm. Some of the symptoms of your blood sugar being too high include: having to go to the bathroom often, being thirsty all of the time, and losing weight without changing your food intake or exercise routine. Some of the symptoms of your blood sugar being too low include: feeling anxious or being confused, feeling numb in the arms and hands, a shaking or dizzy feeling, being cranky and irritable for no reason, pale or gray skin color, headache, blurred or double vision, tired, sweaty, and being hungry sometimes even after eating a meal. If your blood sugar drops too low a person can lose consciousness or may experience a seizure. If you are having these symptoms often it would be wise to go see your Doctor and get a check up. The only way to truly measure your blood sugar levels is to get it checked out.
The main point that I wanted to bring across today is that when and what you eat are important to your body. And if you know some of these symptoms along with what times and what kinds of food you are eating you can better manage your health. Just as long as you remember to be eating the right kinds of foods. First and most important is to stay away from refined sugars, soft drinks, and things that are not healthy for your body. You could keep a food journal of the foods that you are eating, what times you are eating them, and see how you feel. If you are irritable or really tired in the afternoon maybe your blood sugar or glucose levels are low and you need to eat a healthy snack. It could be you are going too long in between meals. I found it interesting on the segment how they talked about combining different types of food to maintain a more stable blood sugar. One example they use is to combine high-quality carbohydrates with lean protein such as: "an egg-white omelet loaded with veggies for breakfast" or "grilled chicken and peppers in a whole-grain tortilla for lunch". So pay attention to what your body is telling you and what you are putting into your body. Doing this can be a quick fix for a happier and healthier you!! Happy Healthier Eating!

Sources:
www.joybauer.com/healthy-living/good-mood-food.aspx
www.angelfire.com/hi/TheSeer/bloogsugar.html
www.kidshealth.org/teen/managing_diabetes/living/hypoglycemia.html
www.kidshealth.org/teen/diabetes_basics/what/high_blood_sugar.html

Wisdom Wednesday!!

How to make:

Organic Powdered Sugar

When I tell people that I make my own powdered sugar they don't think it is really that easy. But it really is. So today for our Wisdom Wednesday I'm going to show you step by step how I make it at home using only a few things that most kitchens have.

To start off with, this is what you will need:

A basic blender, really this is all I use, Evaporated Cane Juice, Corn starch, one cup measuring cup, and one tablespoon.

First, take one tablespoon of corn starch,
and put it into the blender.

Next, take one cup of evaporated cane juice,

and put it into the blender.

Then place lid on blender and turn it on to the highest setting it has.

It will then start to work it's magic. Sometimes to speed up time I will tilt the base of the blender while holding the top on so the blades will continue to blend.

See it start to turn a little white.

After about 3-4 minutes, or less depending on if you tilted or not, it will look like this.

And there you have it, organic homemade powdered sugar.

I keep mine in jar on the counter for quick access. I usually make 2 or 3 batches at a time unless I need it for frosting, then I'll make more. I've never tried to double a batch. I've only done one cup at a time. I don't think my blender could do it and do a good job. Maybe a vita mix could do a double batch?

That's it, really that is all it takes. Only a few minutes and you have a healthier and much cheaper alternative! Happy Healthier eating!

Wisdom Wednesday!

Sugar answer 'B', what are some refined sugar substitutes?

The refined sugar substitute I use the most is Evaporated Cane Juice. It is the same sugar, at the beginning, as refined sugar. It just isn't sent to a refining factory after the first 24 hours of processing. So it only goes through the first 3 steps (see post here for more info). It is still sugar and should be used in moderation, but a much healthier form of sugar. There are a lot of sugars out there that say 'Organic sugar', and I'm not sure what that means. I've heard some say that it is just refined sugar with a little molasses added to it after it has gone through the entire refining process. Because I don't know for sure I stick with Evaporated Cane Juice. When you are buying organic sugar just look at the ingredients listed on the back of the package to make sure. If it says organic sugar and molasses as the only ingredients then I would personally stay away from it. And that is just because I don't know any more information about it. Study it out before you commit to buying a lot of anything.

You can buy Evaporated Cane Juice at Health Food stores, some grocery stores, and at Costco (it's MUCH cheaper at Costco). Evaporated cane juice also comes in a brown sugar form and powered sugar form, though I usually just like to make my own powered sugar from my evaporated cane juice at home.

The next substitute I like to use is Honey. Honey has been around for ever. My kids love honey! We go through it pretty quickly so I buy it in these huge 60 pound buckets. I mostly use honey in my breads, some muffins, and pancake syrup. There are some things that you can't use honey in place of sugar. It really depends on the recipe.

The next substitute I'll talk to you about is, Agave. It is a wonderful replacement for Corn Syrup, sugar, and honey. Agave is a plant. It is grown in hot climates. There are several different types of Agave plants. The most popular is Blue Agave. Agave nectar or syrup is made from the sap of a 7-10 year old plant. There are both light and dark nectar's. Agave is a low glycemic index sweetener, which means it doesn't raise and lower your blood sugar like sugar and honey will. And the blue agave plant is the most stable on the glycemic index. The taste is a little like honey but not as sweet as honey is. I've heard it said that if you don't like honey you'll like Agave. I think their both fine, thought I do like honey a little more if you're eating it straight from the bottle.

Some bloggers have said that it doesn't have the same properties of corn syrup so you can't make hard candies out of it. I'm not a scientist but I'm here to tell you you can!!! We make tons of home made suckers in my home and we do it with agave. It is slightly different with temperature and things that I'll get into in another post when I tell you how you can make your own suckers at home too. So for now just take it from me it works!

You can buy Agave pretty much everywhere. I've seen it in most grocery stores I've been in (sometimes it's hard to find), the Health Food Stores of course, and now Costco is carrying it too and again it is much cheaper there.

Hope that helps, Happy Substituting!!

Wisdom Wednesdays!!

Wednesdays are now dedicated to Wisdom. Knowledge is Power. The more you know the healthier you can become. I am not saying I am all knowing, but with my health issues I have researched and found some things to help me and my family become more healthy. And I would like to share them with you. I will also address any questions you might have, so feel free to ask away. I'm not saying I'll know the answer but I will do as much research as I can to help you with your question. Happy Learning!

Today I will address the subject people talk to me about all of the time, refined sugar. What is so bad about refined sugar and what are the substitutions for it? I will have to take up two Wednesdays to really address these questions on refined sugar. So before I really dive into this post 'A' on refined sugar, I want to say that 'moderation in all things' is the most important. No matter what kind of sweetener you use you shouldn't consume large portions of it, or even have it every day. You shouldn't let your children eat it constantly. Even with the Panda licorice I posted about last Friday, I only let my children have it every once in a while. It is not an everyday treat by any means.

Okay now that that is out of the way, and before we really get into the many reasons that refined sugar is bad for you, let's talk about how sugar is made. There are two types of plants that sugar comes from, cane and beet. Once these two plants are refined to the point of white refined sugar we see in the store, there is no difference in taste or texture. 70% of the worlds sugar come from the cane plant. There are many stages and processes that the cane plant goes through to get to refined sugar. It is important that you understand how many steps in the process there are to see and really understand why refined sugar is bad for you.

Brazil exports 7 million tons of sugar each year. The first set of steps only takes 24 hours from the time the cane is harvested.

So here we go, step one. The cane is cut it is taken to the factory where extraction of the cane juice is the first step is the process. A series of roller mills crush the cane and the juice comes out. The juice gets dirty because dirt and other parts of the plant fall with the juice. Slaked lime is used to get the dirt out. It helps the dirt settle so it can be picked up and then it's sent back out to the field. Once that is done it is on to step two, evaporation. The juice is thickened into syrup by boiling so the water will evaporate out. Then on to step three, boiling. The syrup is then taken to big pans where there is more boiling to get more water out so crystallization can occur. After that the crystals are washed and dried. That is all that Brazil and other countries will do to the now "raw" sugar. Then it is shipped to refining plants around the world where more steps are made to make refined sugar.

The first stage, which is really step four, of the raw sugar is Affination. The raw sugar is softened and then they remove the layer of 'mother liquor' that surrounds the crystals. Then on to their step one, really step five, carbonation. It happens by adding milk of lime (calcium hydroxide) to the liquor and bubbling carbon dioxide though the mixture. The gas reacts with the lime to form fine crystalline particles of calcium carbonate which separates the solids. After that the liquor is filtered through leaf filters. The liquor is pumped from the outside of the leaf to the middle where the clear liquor is collected. Now it is ready for step six, Decolourisation. This is where they take all the color out of the liquor. They pump the liquor though columns of medium. There are two different mediums they use. Either activated carbon or an ion exchange resin. Both remove any color so the liquor is now crystal clear and ready for step seven, boiling. They boil any access water off so that crystals can form, and they have refined sugar. But that is not all! Sometimes there is liquor left after crystals are formed and they take that liquor and put it through the process all over again to make more refined sugar. But that's really refined refined sugar isn't it?! www.sucrose.com

So you see there really isn't anything left after seven steps. You just have sweetness. In fact, because they have taken pretty much everything out it is harder for your body to break down the refined sugar. It actually leaches out vitamins and minerals from your body just so it can be digested!

To put it simply, refined Sugar is not good for you. One of the more important things it does is attack your immune system. It weakens your body so it will not be able to fight off diseases. It aides in cancer growth. It cuts off oxygen to your brain. It causes hyperactivity in children. It causes learning disabilities. And so on and so on. Here is a simple list of other things sugar does to your body. Go check it out.

Something I don't think people know about sugar is the affect that it has on your brain. It causes a chemical reaction. When you eat sweets it tigers an increase in release of the hormone serotonin and endorphins. Serotonin is a mood elevating hormone. When you have lots of refined sugar your brain and your body get used to this. Your body will start to have more and more cravings for it. Cravings in a healthy person are the body's way of saying it needs or is lacking something. But not in the case of someone who eats a lot of refined sugar. There is no way you can tell the difference between a 'good craving'- something your body is needing, or a 'bad craving'- your body wanting higher serotonin levels. If you give in to your bad cravings you keep depleting your body of vitamins and minerals. Endorphins, are the Brain's natural narcotics helping you to relax when you're stressed. There are other ways of getting or releasing endorphins without causing harm to your body. Exercise is one of those ways. So that is a much better thing to do instead of grabbing a candy bar when you're not feeling the best.

There are many more things I could go into about refined sugar and it's dangers. I hope this opened your eyes a little bit about some of those dangers. Next week I'll talk about the more healthy substitutions for refined sugar and other unhealthy sugars that are out there. In the mean time look in your kitchen and see what you can start to cut out of your diet that has a lot of refined sugar in it.