How to Lose Weight on the Treadmill

Treadmill walking is a great way to burn extra calories each day to help you lose weight. Aim to burn 300 extra calories per day with cardio exercise such as brisk walking. This is about 60 minutes per day of moderately-intense exercise, in addition to controlling the number of calories you are eating.
Challenge your body by changing the workout throughout the week with harder days alternating with easier days. You can modify this schedule to fit our own lifestyle. You can add in rest days as needed, but it is best not to have more than one rest day in a row.
If you can't schedule enough time on the treadmill, add one or more non-treadmill 15-minute walks throughout the day.
Heartrate Zone Calculator: Use a calculator to see what your pulse rate should be in order to be in the right intensity zone. Most treadmills have pulse monitors built into them, either in the hand grip or an ear clip, and some will calculate these zones for you. You may also be able to pair a wireless chest strap heart rate monitor with your treadmill for the best accuracy.
Weekly Treadmill Walking Plan
Monday: Fat-Burning Walking Workout: Start the week right with 60 minutes of this fat-burning workout. You will burn between 300 and 400 calories depending on your speed and weight. You can break this workout into two sessions of 30 minutes if you can't set aside a continuous hour.
Tuesday: Health Walk: You put in a great effort on Monday, so today you will take a 30 minute walk at an easier pace for your cardio exercise, at a heart rate of 50-60% of maximum. This is the minimum recommended per day to reduce health risks such as diabetes and heart disease. Use this workout to concentrate on your walking posture and technique. This will help you speed up in your more vigorous workouts. Follow up your treadmill session by working your upper body with dumbbells or exercise bands.

Wednesday: Treadmill Hill Workout: You can burn more calories per minute when using the incline feature of your treadmill. If your treadmill has pre-programmed hill workouts, choose one to use today. You can choose a steady climb or hill intervals. Because you will be working harder, aim for 45 minutes and get in at least 30 minutes of hill work, with your heart rate in the fat-burning zone of 60-70% of your maximum heart rate.
Thursday: Health Walk: 30 minutes at a moderate pace. Follow it up with Abdominal-Core Workout exercises.
Friday: Speed Intervals Workout: Most treadmills come with pre-programmed workouts that include going faster at a challenging pace, then slowing for two minutes to catch your breath, and again speeding up. Intervals of 30 seconds to one minute fast, with two minutes of recovery, can burn through calories. Choose one of these today and aim for a 30 to 45 minute workout. If you are comfortable jogging, you can alternate jogging for your speed interval and walking for the recovery interval. If your treadmill doesn't have a speed interval program, vary the speed yourself using 2 - 4 minute speed formats .
Saturday: Distance Workout: Aim for an hour or more of walking on the treadmill at a comfortable pace. You may want to catch up on video while you walk. Or, take your walking outdoors for the day and walk in a park, along a greenway, shopping or exploring. Wear a pedometer or track you mileage so you can balance how many activity calories you are burning with any weekend diet splurges that may be planned.
Sunday: Active Fun and Stretching: Put your walking legs to work just enjoying an active day with friends and family. Use a Warm-Up Stretching Routine to loosen up. Experiment with other activities such as bicycling or swimming, which will exercise different muscle groups from walking. The goal today is finding joy in moving and being alive.
Week 2
Repeat the treadmill workout week pattern. Explore the different pre-programmed workouts on your treadmill for variety on the hill workout day and the speed interval day.
If you haven't been walking regularly for fitness, you may need to start off with shorter treadmill sessions and build up your time each day. Achieve 60 minutes per day of activity by adding 15-minute walks throughout the day as needed.
To lose weight with exercise, you also need to control the amount that you eat. Start a sensible diet and use a food diary to be honest with yourself about your calories eaten. Use the free Calorie Count web site and app to log your calories eaten and exercise calories burned.
If you burn 300 more calories per day than you eat, you can expect a weight loss rate of one pound per week.
Week 3 and Onward
Modify the weekly schedule to fit into your lifestyle. Work on your walking form, especially using our tips on how to walk faster so you can burn more calories within the same workout session.
Wishing you weight loss success on the treadmill!

Burn More Fat - Secrets of Exercise Physiology

We all want to burn more fat for weight loss, body shaping, health and well being or for sporting purposes. Trim that butt, waste that cellulite, smooth those love handles, bust that belly; it's all part of the trim and slim exercise and diet activity many of us indulge in.

In this article (which is a a little science-cy) you will see exactly how fat burning works and how to get the best out of your exercise program. Also, I'll outline two weights circuit programs I developed to help you burn fat and lose weight -- one for beginners and one for fitter trainers.

The Basics of Fat Burning

Energy in, energy out. The body normally burns a mix of carbohydrate, as glucose, and fat for fuel. How much of either depends on your physical activity and if, or what you have eaten recently. When you use more energy than you take in from food and drink, the body burns stored fat and carbohydrates, and then even protein, to fuel your everyday activities even if you are not exercising

That's what happens when people starve of course; the body starts to eat itself. Depending on your family history -- your genetics -- and the way you eat and exercise to create this energy deficit, your body may decide to get conservative and drop your metabolic rate to try to hold onto body weight. Some of us seem to have inherited this tendency more than others, the origins of which may be in the early periods of human evolution where 'feast or famine' was more or less the norm.

Glucose, fat and protein. Even so, starvation always works eventually and the body starts to break down its own tissue for fuel. Stored carbohydrate called glycogen is quickly used up, then goes the fat stored under the skin and around the internal organs. Protein in muscle is then broken down to create glucose to keep the brain working and you conscious.

Fat and glucose are the body's two main energy sources. Fat you know well, glucose comes mainly from carbohydrate foods like rice and bread and potatoes and protein is supplied mainly by meat and beans and dairy products. The amino acid building blocks of protein foods can be converted to glucose in emergencies. Your body always burns a mix of fat and glucose except at very high intensities, and the ratio of the fat and glucose in 'the burn' varies with intensity and time of exercise.

Fat burning zone. You may have noticed that some bikes and treadmills at the gym have a setting that says 'fat burning zone', which implies a setting for intensity or speed. The reason for this is that the body burns a greater percentage of fat at a slow pace (or after about 90 minutes of exercise). The fat burning zone, a low intensity speed zone is mainly a gimmick, and here is the reason.

Even though you burn more fat going slowly, you still burn some fat at much faster speeds or intensity. It all boils down to how much energy you expend in totality. For example, if you compare exercising at a slow rate that burns 60 percent fat and 40 percent glucose and a higher intensity or duration that burns only 30 percent fat and 70 percent glucose, you may still burn more fat at the higher intensity.

A typical example. Exercise (1) is the slower 60/40 mix and exercise (2) is the faster, 30/70 mix of fat and glucose fuel.

1. Walking on a treadmill for 30 minutes -- 180 calories used -- 108 calories of fat burned
2. Running on a treadmill for 30 minutes -- 400 calories used -- 120 calories of fat burned

You can see from this example that the bottom line really is how much energy you expend -- and that is the ultimate fat burning measure. The theoretical fat burning zone is mostly a convenient myth.

Weight Training Does it Better -- Or Does It?

Muscle burns more fat. Weight training is increasingly recommended as a fat-busting tool because some experts say extra muscle burns more energy than body fat at rest, so if you develop more muscle and have a higher muscle to fat ratio than before, you must burn extra energy and more stored fat as a result. This is true and has been shown in metabolic studies. However, the differences are not that dramatic; perhaps less than a few tens of calories per day for each pound of muscle increased, for most people.

Does that mean you shouldn't worry about weight training? Certainly not, because weight training has many other benefits for health and performance, not the least of which is extra muscle. Just that this advantage has been somewhat overstated and we need to get this fat burning thing right in order to develop the best weight loss and performance programs.

Getting the afterburn. Okay, so extra muscle does not provide that much advantage, but what about the afterburn? The 'afterburn', or the amount of energy you use after you stop exercising, has been promoted as an important slimming idea. If you can get afterburn, which is really another way of saying your metabolism increases for several hours or longer after a particular exercise, then that's a bonus because you burn fat during the exercise and after you cease as well. Will the fun ever stop!

However, this idea has recently been reconsidered as well. An article in the Journal of Sports Science reported that despite some promising early studies of this effect, the idea has not proven to be as useful as first thought.

Exercise scientists call this afterburn effect EPOC, which stands for Excess Post-exercise Oxygen Consumption. The authors of that study say that the high intensities required -- greater than about 75 percent of maximum heart rate -- are probably beyond what most people wanting to lose weight can cope with in sustained exercise. So the afterburn advantage from lifting weights or running fast is there, but you need to be able to sustain that intensity, which means a lot of hard work. No secrets there, I'm sure.

We also need to consider how fuel is used preferentially according to how your body stores are maintained. After you do a vigorous or long workout, your blood and muscle glucose will be much lower than before you started. Low glucose stores signal the body to burn fat preferentially. So after hard exercise that uses a lot of glucose, the body switches to burning fat. That's why all energy expenditure is important, not just fat burning during exercise.

Strength training has so many great things going for it that I'm a big fan -- increased strength, more muscle and body shape, better balance and bone density and improved functionality across all facets of human movement. But let’s be honest, we all need aerobic or cardio training as well. It has its own set of important functional benefits including general fitness, elastic arteries, increased heart and lung function and lower blood pressure to name a few benefits.

Lifting weights can easily move us into the high intensity exercise zone above the 75 percent effort required to get some afterburn, but it's only for short bursts. This is not consistent, steady-state effort and does not generally burn as much energy as a good run on the treadmill, cycle or row machine at moderate pace. For example, here are the energy expenditure calculations for weights versus cardio for one hour of exercise from the NAT Nutritional Analysis Tools web site. I've based this on a 150 pound person (just under 70 kilograms).

1. Running at 8 minutes a mile pace (5 min/km) -- burn 852 calories (kilocalories)
2. Weight lifting, vigorous, free weights or machines -- burn 409 calories (kilocalories)

I’ve tried to line these activities up for effort so that the comparison is worthwhile. Whenever I check these numbers it astounds me because I run and I lift weights, and sometimes I feel much fresher after a run than going for it in the gym with sub-10 RM (repetition maximum) and three sets of ten exercises. Nevertheless, the numbers always come out the same with any reputable energy calculator. Sustained aerobics always spends about twice the energy of weight training in a comparable comparison. You can see from this why cardio sessions are important for fat loss.

Should I Exercise Before Breakfast to Burn More Fat?

The answer is 'not necessarily', because even though you will burn more fat on an empty stomach, ultimately this will probably make little difference because your energy intake and expenditure and metabolism balances out, more or less, over the 24-hour period. What really matters is your total energy intake and expenditure, that is, how much you eat and how much you exercise and move in general.

However, stay tuned on this because until this is examined further scientifically, how much meal timing manipulation could help with fat loss is not certain. One thing that seems clear is that people who eat breakfast maintain weight better and lose fat quicker, so don’t skip breakfast.

The Best Strategy for Fat Loss

So where are we at with our fat burning project? Here is a summary.

Increase muscle with weight training. Extra muscle helps to burn more energy at rest, even if only a little. This is called the resting metabolic rate of muscle or RMR. Extra muscle will also burn more fat in active phase, the active metabolic rate if you like, or the AMR, so having more muscle will definitely help burn more energy and fat.

Lift heavier weights. What I suggest is that the weights workout should be vigorous, with the number of repetitions kept at the low to medium end of the scale between 8 and 12 RM. To remind you, the RM is the repetition maximum, which means the most weight you can lift for this number of reps before fatigue. The 8-12 is within a range that should provide strength and bigger muscle growth, which is called hypertrophy.

If you go higher than this, say 15 to 20 repetitions to a set, or more, you are getting into the range where you would probably be better off doing cardio because the return on effort, the energy burn, is better spent jogging, cycling, stepping or rowing. At that number of repetitions you won’t build much muscle either, so very high-repetition training with weights has minimum value in my view.

Do aerobic exercise. Considering how much energy you would use in an hour of either type of exercise, weights or cardio, you must do some consistent aerobic or cardio work to burn fat.

Try high-intensity cardio. High-intensity exercise, even if only in short bursts, may rev up the metabolism and get that fat mobilized in the post-exercise period. Do some high intensity as well, but don’t overdo it, because burning the fat is a long-term project and you don’t want to get ‘burned out’. A group exercise program such as a solid cycle spin class might match this requirement. In fact, I highly recommend group cycle spin classes where you are encouraged to go fast, yet with the option to slow down if you need to.

Weights and Cardio Circuit Training Programs

Combining weights and cardio in a circuit interval session is also an excellent approach to fat burning. The weights circuits are based on the idea of mixing high and low-intensity weights and cardio in a circuit.   Cardio while using weights are like two great taste that taste great together...

Thanks for Reading..........

Ten Mistakes to Avoid When Building Muscle and Losing Fat

Everyone wants to build muscle and lose fat: that's pretty much the Holy Grail of weight training and physical conditioning. But can it be done? The body does not like to perform two contradictory physiological processes at the same time. Your body has evolved to either increase fat, muscle (and bone) in times of plenty, and, as you might imagine, do just the opposite in scarce times when food availability is low.

To get a nice looking body, say six-pack abs, you need to hold onto or increase muscle while shedding loads of fat. That's the problem targeted in this list of ten mistakes to avoid when trying to accomplish this.

1. Not Eating Enough

You can't pack on muscle if you don't create an anabolic environment, which means you must eat enough to maintain ideal body weight. It does not have to be huge amounts of protein. See the Bodybuilding Diet for more information.

2. Eating Too Much (Not knowing how much to eat and how much you do eat)

This relates to item 1. In calorimetric scientific tests (double-labeled water), many people under-estimate how much they eat. Very low-calorie diets are not necessary, but you do have to count calories at some level to cut your total energy intake to lose fat. See the Calorie Count site for good information.

3. Eating Too Much of Refined Carbohydrates

Carbohydrates per say are not your enemy, but you do have to restrict consumption of foods that are enticing and easy to consume and snack on, and have less than ideal effect on your appetite. Biscuits, cakes, muffins, candies, puddings, potato chips and crisps, crackers, sugary drinks etc -- these items need to be curtailed substantially. Eat healthy.

4. Eating Too Much Fat (Of any kind)

Nutritionally, you may know about good fats and bad fats, but to lose weight (fat weight) getting your fat intake between 20 and 30 per cent is a useful approach. Fat has 9 calories per gram and it doesn't matter what fat it is.

6. Eating Insufficient Protein

You don't have to go crazy about this and consume protein drinks day in day out, but replacing some of those refined carbohydrates and fat with a modest increase in protein should help maintain or enhance your muscle while you're losing fat. Don't make it all animal protein though: dairy and vegetable protein are good options. And you still need to exercise those muscles.

6. Insufficient Weight Training (Three days each week please)

As you lose fat, the only way to protect that muscle and bone from going down with it is to place stimulatory stress on that muscle and bone. That means relatively intense weight training workouts at least three days each week.

7. Weight Training with Insufficient Intensity (Train at 65%+ of 1RM)

You won't gain much value from spending fifty minutes at the gym lifting light weights with a lot of repetitions. You need to lift relatively heavy (even if not to failure) for each set that you do. Ideally this should be at least around 65% of your maximum lift possible. If you can squat 130 pounds (60 kilograms) maximum, then you should look at training with 85 pounds (38 kilos). If you don't or cannot measure your maximums, then make sure the final repetition in any set is hard work to complete. Eight to twelve repetitions and three to four sets for each exercise is a good basic program.

8. Not Doing Any Cardio (But don't overdo it)

Aerobic exercise helps you burn off those calories. Steady-state cardio at moderate pace, in conjunction with a good weights program, will get you in a good place for fat loss. If you do cardio for longer than about an hour you risk breaking down muscle for fuel, and you need to hang onto as much muscle as you can in this scenario.

9. Exercising on an Empty Stomach (And not refueling after exercise)

When your body is fuel hungry, either during intense exercise or when your metabolism has been revved up for the few hours after you exercise and you have not eaten, unless you give it some fuel, your muscle may be broken apart for glucose by the hormone cortisol. The trick is to provide just enough carbohydrate to prevent cortisol performing this negative task, but not enough to cause your body to slip into positive energy balance (too much energy input). A piece of toast and honey or a small sports drink or chocolate milk or equivalent, before and after exercise should achieve this.

10. Insufficient Precision and Application

This may seem obvious, but what we are attempting to achieve here is not trivial. For most successful weight losers, the net loss includes fat and muscle and often some bone as well. This is the result of catabolism, the breaking down of body tissue that defines weight loss. To achieve our muscle maintenance (or enhancement) and fat loss goals, you have to have a clearly documented program and goals, and you have to apply it with precision, which means taking the time to apply each step accurately, logging those steps in a diary and recording energy inputs and outputs in the form of food and physical activity.

In conclusion, one last point concerns overtraining. Don't be afraid to take a week off or reduce your training by 50% for one week if you feel your body is not coping with the volume and intensity. Cycling volume and rest may even be important for healthy muscle growth. Go to it!

Thanks for Reading.......

14 Foods You Should Never Eat

Disgusted By Food?

What's the one food you refuse to eat? Peas, tofu, liver and onions? Whatever it is, it's probably because you don't like the way it tastes, not necessarily because it contains ingredients suspected of causing cancer or because it was picked by farmers wearing Hazmat suits. Yet, there are still a lot of those foods on store shelves, and food-industry insiders, who know what goes on behind the scenes, refuse to eat them. We polled some of those insiders—people who know the business and work daily to evict pesticides, genetically modified organisms, animal cruelty, social injustice, and unhealthy foods from the food supply—to find out what they know about the dark side of "convenience" foods and what they will eat. Take note so you, too, can avoid the worst of what grocery stores have to offer.

Swordfish

Philip Landrigan, MD, professor of pediatrics and professor and chair of preventive medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine

The Problem: One of Dr. Landrigan's No. 1 warnings to women pregnant or looking to become pregnant? "Make avoiding mercury in fish a priority," he says. Swordfish is notoriously high in the heavy metal, a potent neurotoxin that can damage developing children and even trigger heart attacks in adults. Aside from obvious health concerns, swordfish is often overfished and some of the gear commonly used to wrangle in swordfish often kills turtles, seabirds, and sharks.

The Solution: For a healthy omega-3 brain boost, look for fish that are low in contaminants and have stable populations, such as wild-caught Alaskan salmon, Atlantic mackerel, or pole- or troll-caught Pacific albacore tuna. Got a more adventurous palate? Try snakehead fish to satisfy your fish craving and improve the environment. The invasive species lives on land and water, where it wipes out important frogs, birds, and other critters. Snakehead fish is popping up on some restaurant menus, and the taste and texture is about identical to swordfish.

Nonorganic Strawberries

Robert Kenner, director of Food Inc. and founder of FixFood.org

The Problem: While filming Food Inc., Kenner says he wanted to film strawberry farmers applying pesticides to their fields. "The workers wear these suits to protect themselves from the dozens and dozens of known dangerous pesticides applied to strawberries," he says. "When I saw this, I thought to myself, if this is how berries are grown, I don't really want to eat them anymore. I haven't been able to eat a nonorganic strawberry ever since." Unfortunately, for the food-concerned public, he wasn't able to get the shot of these farmers. "I guess they didn't think it looked too appetizing."

The Solution: Opt for organic! The Environmental Working Group, which analyzes U.S. Department of Agriculture pesticide-residue data, has found 13 different pesticide residues on chemically grown strawberries.

Diet Soda

Isaac Eliaz, MD, integrative health expert and founder of The Amitabha Medical Clinic and Healing Center in Sebastopol, CA

The Problem: Dr. Eliaz stays away from any diet soda or foods, sugar-free candies, and gum containing artificial sweeteners such as sucralose, aspartame, acesulfame K, and neotame, among others. "The safety data on these sweeteners is shrouded in controversy and conflicts of interest with the manufacturers of these chemical compounds," Dr. Eliaz warns. "Independent research strongly suggests that when metabolized in the body, these sweeteners can cause health-related issues and problems related to metabolism and weight gain, neurological diseases, joint pain, digestive problems, headaches, depression, inflammatory bowel disease, chemical toxicity, and cancer, among others."

The Solution: If you're craving a soda but want to avoid the shady sweeteners, fake food dyes, and preservatives found in popular brands, try a bottle of Steaz zero-calorie green tea soda or Bionade, a fermented soda that's majorly popular in Europe.

Anything from McDonald's

Joel Salatin, sustainable farmer and author of This Ain't Normal, Folks

The Problem: McDonald's isn't just about food-it's about food mentality, according to Salatin. "It represents the pinnacle of factory-farming and industrial food," he says. "The economic model is utterly dependent on stockholders looking for dividends without regards to farm profitability or soil development."

Fast food typically is loaded with all sorts of the ingredients mentioned earlier in our list-genetically engineered corn, food dyes, artificial sweeteners, and other bad actors in the food supply. The type of farming that supports this type of food business relies on harmful chemicals that not only threaten human health, but also soil health.

The Solution: Learn to cook! You might be surprised to find that paying extra up front for a pasture-raised chicken can be cheaper than buying prepared fast-food chicken. For instance, cooking a chicken and then boiling down the bones for a rich, disease-fighting stock can yield up to three meals for a family! Find sustainable farmers at LocalHarvest.org.

Canned Tomatoes

Frederick vom Saal, PhD, professor of biological sciences at the University of Missouri

The Problem: The resin linings of tin cans contain bisphenol-A, or BPA, a synthetic estrogen that has been linked to ailments ranging from reproductive problems to heart disease, diabetes, and obesity. Studies show that the BPA in most people's bodies exceeds the amount that suppresses sperm production or causes chromosomal damage to the eggs of animals. "You can get 50 micrograms of BPA per liter out of a tomato can, and that's a level that is going to impact people, particularly the young," says vom Saal. "I won't go near canned tomatoes."

The Solution: Choose tomatoes in glass bottles (which do not need resin linings), such as the brands Eden Organic and Bionaturae. You can also get several types in Tetra Pak boxes, such as Trader Joe's and Pomi.

Bread

William Davis, MD, cardiologist and author of the New York Times best-seller Wheat Belly

The Problem: Modern wheat is nothing like the grain your mother or grandmother consumed. Today, wheat barely resembles its original form, thanks to extensive genetic manipulations of the 1960s and '70s to increase yields. "You cannot change the basic characteristics of a plant without changing its genetics, biochemistry, and its effects on humans who consume it," Dr. Davis notes.

In his book, Dr. Davis makes the case that modern-day wheat is triggering all sorts of health problems, everything from digestive diseases like celiac and inflammatory bowel disease to acid reflux, obesity, asthma, and skin disorders. "If there is a food that yields extravagant, extraordinary, and unexpected benefits when avoided, it is bread," says Dr. Davis. "And I don't mean white bread; I mean all bread: white, whole wheat, whole grain, sprouted, organic, French, Italian, fresh, day-old…all of it."

The Solution: Try eliminating bread from your diet for a few weeks to see if you note health improvements. When you do choose grains, look to things like quinoa, buckwheat, millet, and wild rice, but in smaller quantities (less than a half cup) because these can also trigger high blood sugar, Dr. Davis says.

Industrially Produced Hamburgers

Michael Pollan, author of numerous books and articles on the food system including The Omnivore’s Dilemma, In Defense of Food and Food Rules

The Problem: Cattle raised in filthy conditions, pumped full of growth hormones and fed diets composed mostly of genetically modified corn are three major reasons humane, grass-fed ground beef is a better alternative for your burger. But they aren't the only ones, says Pollan. While a steak or roast usually comes from a single animal, processors of ground beef combine meat from hundreds of animals. "This vastly increases the risk of contamination," he says. USDA scientists have found dangerous levels of disease-causing bacteria in over 50 percent of ground beef samples they've tested.

The Solution: "I love hamburgers, but only eat them when they're grass-fed and ground by a butcher," Pollan says.

Corn

Maryam Henein and George Langworthy, directors of the documentary Vanishing of the Bees

The Problem: Today's corn plants are more like little pesticide factories with roots. Most of the nation's corn supply is genetically engineered to either produce its own pesticide supply within the plant or withstand heavy sprayings of chemicals, which wind up inside of the food. That's problematic not just for bees, but for people, too. "I avoid corn because most is genetically modified, and on top of that, most of the seeds are treated with systemic pesticides that are killing our bees," says Henein. "And let's not be fooled—the sublethal effects of these pesticides also slowly impair our health."

The Solution: In one way or another, corn is present in the vast majority of processed foods. From ketchup to salad dressing, and even bread, it's hard to escape corn ingredients. One to look out for? "I always try to avoid foods containing high-fructose corn syrup," says Langworthy. "Not only is it unhealthy, but the pesticides used in the production of the corn is detrimental to honeybees and other pollinators."

To avoid genetically engineered corn, which has never been tested for long-term impacts on human health, choose organic or Non-GMO Verified foods.

White Chocolate

Drew Ramsey, MD, assistant clinical professor of Psychiatry at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and coauthor of The Happiness Diet

The Problem: The right kind of chocolate serves not only as a sweet treat but a brain-boosting superfood, too. The problem is, white chocolate's health profile is blank. "The data on the health benefits of cacao is pretty awesome," says Dr. Ramsey. "Much of this is due to a set of amazing phytonutrients that can increase blood flow to the brain, protect blood vessels, and boost mood and focus. White chocolate is missing all this goodness."

The Solution: Indulging in a chocolate treat? Look for organic versions from companies like Theo and NibMor.

Artificial Sweeteners

Maria Rodale, CEO of Rodale Inc. and author of Organic Manifesto

The Problem: Ironically, there's a lot of evidence that suggest using artificial sweeteners, which have zero calories, is just as bad for your waistline as using regular, high-calorie sugar. For instance, research from the University of Texas has found that mice fed the artificial sweetener aspartame had higher blood sugar levels (which can cause you to overeat) than mice on an aspartame-free diet. Not only are they bad for your health, scientists have detected artificial sweeteners in treated wastewater, posing unknown risks to fish and other marine life. Plus, as Rodale says, "They're unnatural, nonorganic, taste horrible, and lead to all sorts of bad health consequences, false expectations, and short-term strategic thinking."

The Solution: Refined white sugar isn't any healthier, but you can replace it with small amounts of nutritional sweeteners, including honey, blackstrap molasses, and maple syrup, all of which have high levels of vitamins and minerals.

Sprouts

Doug Powell, PhD, professor of food safety at Kansas State University and author of the BarfBlog food-safety website

The Problem: Sprouts have been the source of so many major food recalls that they're not worth the risk, Powell says. Whether bean or broccoli, alfalfa or pea, sprouts have been at the center of at least 40 significant outbreaks of foodborne illness over the past 20 years. They're often found to be contaminated with salmonella, E. coli, and listeria; they're vulnerable to contamination because the seeds require moist, warm conditions in order to sprout—conditions that are ideal for bacteria to multiply.

The Solution: Get the crunch of sprouts—without the added bacteria—by shredding cabbage or carrots onto your sandwiches. If you really enjoy the flavor of sprouts, cook them first.

Butter-Flavored Microwave Popcorn

Alexandra Scranton, director of science and research at Women's Voices for the Earth, a nonprofit that advocates for environmental health issues that directly affect women

The Problem: Diacetyl, a chemical used in butter flavoring, is used in a lot of fake butter flavorings, despite the fact that the chemical is so harmful to factory workers that it's known to cause an occupational disease called "popcorn lung," Scranton says. After news of the chemical got out to the popcorn-eating public, companies started replacing diacetyl with another additive—which can actually turn into diacetyl under certain conditions, she adds. Neither chemical is disclosed on microwave-popcorn bags because the exact formulations of flavorings are considered trade secrets. "It's a classic example of the need for better chemical regulation and improved transparency on the chemicals used in our food and other household products," she says.

The Solution: Make your own popcorn using real butter. Pop it on the stovetop in a pot, or go an easier route: Put a small handful of kernels into a brown paper lunch bag and stick the bag in the microwave. The kernels will pop just like those fake-butter-flavored kernels in standard microwave popcorn bags. When they're done, pour some melted organic butter over them. "Makes pretty good popcorn at a fraction of the cost!" Scranton says.

Food Dyes

Michael F. Jacobson, PhD, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest

The Problem: Health advocates have tried for years to get the Food and Drug Administration to ban food dyes, based on small studies linking them to hyperactivity in children and cancer in animals, and that's one reason Jacobson avoids them. Red 3 has caused cancer in lab rats, and Yellow 5 and Yellow 6 may contain cancer-causing contaminants. But mainly, he says, he avoids them on principle. "I just don't like eating synthetic chemicals and the oftentimes synthetic foods in which they're used." His group criticizes companies that use food dyes to make foods appear healthier than they are and to replace truly healthy ingredients—in a recent report on the nutritional quality of fruit juices, the center noted that Tropicana Twister Cherry Berry Blast contains no berry and cherry juice but lots of the artificial dye, Red 40.

The Solution: Read labels anytime you're buying a prepackaged food. Food dyes can crop up in some really unexpected places, even healthy foods like cheese and yogurt.

Chain-Restaurant Ice Cream Sundaes

Dave Zinczenko, author of the Eat This, Not That series of books

The Problem: "No matter where you go, the ice cream sundaes made in most chain restaurants have a couple things in common—namely, supersized portions and an ingredient list a mile long," he says. "All you really need for ice cream is milk, sugar, and maybe a little vanilla, but somehow these places are loading it up with corn syrup, cellulose gum, and vegetable shortening." In addition to being unhealthy, those additives are usually derived from genetically modified corn and soy.

The Solution: Go local, says Zinczenko. Small-batch ice cream from local stores is less likely to be some industry Franken-food creation. Or, for totally homemade sundaes, you could try making your own ice cream. "A killer caramel sauce can be made with just sugar, butter, and heat, and you'll never have to wonder what kind of chemicals you're loading up on," he says. "Plus, you'll control your portion size, which means you can indulge in moderation without widening your waistline."
I know this was a Wow to some even me .........
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6 ways to better enjoy your next dining experience

You get what you pay for, right? It turns out, when a meal is more expensive, you’re more likely to enjoy it, according to a new Cornell University study.
Researchers handed out fliers advertising the cost of an all-you-can-eat pizza buffet as either $4 or $8 to 139 diners at an Italian restaurant in upstate New York. After the meal, those who paid the higher price for the buffet rated the pizza as tastier, more satisfying, and enjoyable than those who paid $4 for the exact same meal.
How come? Consumers generally associate a higher price with a higher-quality product, says study author Ozge Sigirci, a researcher at Cornell’s Food Lab, and this research shows the same applies to eating out. So opting to splurge on that better cut of steak is just one way to increase your satisfaction with a night out. Here are 5 more surprising ways you can upgrade your meal experience when eating at any restaurant.

Ask for a quiet corner

Loud background noise not only leaves you shouting across the table, it actually suppresses salty and sweet flavors and lowers overall enjoyment of food, according to researchers in the Netherlands. That’s because the background noise draws your attention away from your meal, so you’re less likely to pay attention to the subtle flavors that make food more enjoyable, the researchers write.

Look at some food porn

Feel free to ogle the dessert tray at the next table even if you’re not having any. Swiss researchers found that guys who looked at pictures of high-calorie fare, like pizza or a pastry, before eating a bland-tasting piece of food enjoyed it more than after looking at a picture of a low-calorie food, like watermelon or green beans. Why? The high-calorie images activated areas of the brain associated with pleasure, giving the illusion that the neutral-flavored food tasted better.

Choose food and drinks with fancy garnishes

Artistic touches, like sauces drizzled in fancy patterns, can make you think food tastes better, according to a study in the journal Appetite. Like a high price tag, the decorative flourishes trick your brain into thinking the meal is fancier and higher quality, which can affect the way you perceive the taste. Take a peek at the restaurant’s website before heading out to see what dazzles your eyes the most.

Go organic

Turns out it’s good for the planet, your body, and your feelings on the meal: organic labels alone make you believe your meal is more nutritious, according to Cornell researchers. When they asked 115 passersby at a mall food court to sample organic and “non-organic” cookies (they were actually both organic), they found that those who ate the foods labeled organic rated their snacks as 20 to 24 percent lower in calories, and they were willing to pay 16 to 23 percent more for it.

Control hyper kids

Have trouble keeping your toddler from running into the restaurant’s kitchen? Kids are twice as likely to disobey their parents and act rowdy after eating food they have to eat with their front teeth—think drumsticks, corn on the cob, and whole apples—than if they eat food with a fork, according to a small Cornell study. If denying them the grilled cheese will cause even more chaos, cut it up into smaller pieces first, the study suggests.
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6 Tips To Prevent a Pig-Out

Your best weight-loss intentions will inevitably come face-to-face with temptation. Learn to boost your willpower, and keep the pounds off......Here are 6 Tips that will help

Control Your Cravings

It was right there for the taking. After a 5-mile group run, I drove past my favorite takeout place. My stomach was craving—no, demanding—food. A lot of it. I had a recovery shake waiting for me at home, but this was so much faster. Besides, I deserved a reward for burning off almost 800 calories. What's wrong with a tasty payoff for my commitment to health? I turned into the drive-thru lane.

My willpower had failed me. Yes, it had gotten me to my run on time, but it vanished when I needed it most. Any gains I'd made I gave right back. Why couldn't I say no?

It turns out that willpower isn't simply dense moral fiber. The latest science suggests it's found in the soft gray matter of your frontal lobe, where good decisions are made and poor choices are rejected. Your willpower is tough. It helps you fight temptation, prevent binges, choose food wisely, and stay motivated. But it's a finite resource. Nurture it, maintain it, and deploy it with this six-point plan.

Feed your willpower

Here's a surprise: Your willpower runs on sugar. Like your muscles, your brain needs glucose to function at an optimal level, says Roy Baumeister, Ph.D., social psychology area director at Florida State University and coauthor of Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength. In a series of nine studies published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Baumeister discovered that people with steady glucose levels were more persistent at attempting to complete an unsolvable task than those whose glucose levels declined during the experiments. "Increase your blood glucose and you can fuel your willpower," he says.

But put down the Skittles. Sure, glucose is easily available from straight sugar, but your body also creates it from fruit, many vegetables, whole grains, and dairy products. You can even build glucose by pumping up your protein, says Baumeister. "It takes your body longer to make glucose from protein, but the benefits can last longer," he says.

But the problem is that weight-watching men often adopt extreme low-calorie diets. "If you starve yourself, you'll have low glucose," says Baumeister. And without sufficient glucose, your brain doesn't have the fuel it needs to resist junk food. So if you feel your energy fading, don't skip smart snacks, like nuts. (Want a snack without the guilt?

Celebrate wisely

Scientists have a name for my drive-thru cave-in: compensation. It's the inclination to reward yourself for a job well done, and that feeling can fight with your weight-loss intentions. In fact, the harder your workout is, the bigger you may think your compensation should be, says Timothy Church, M.D., Ph.D., director of the laboratory of preventive medicine at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center at Louisiana State University. "When men endure a tough, hourlong workout or push through a 7-mile run, they feel a need to celebrate," he says. "But a good workout is not carte blanche to eat whatever you want."

The solution: Don't rely on your willpower to deny yourself a well-earned treat. Instead, use it to ensure that your reward doesn't outweigh the workout (literally). "Do the math: If you burned off 700 calories, keep your food intake to less than that," says Dr. Church. It's a pat on the back that doesn't wipe out your hard work. Or go with a nonfood reward: Buy yourself an iTunes download every time you work out, or treat yourself to basketball tickets when you rack up 10 training sessions.

Play defense

Well-fed willpower won't resist all temptation. You'll need to conserve your supply so it's always there for you. A recent study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology followed people's reactions to enticements throughout the day. Oddly, people with the best self-control were the ones who used their willpower less often. Instead of fending off one temptation after another, they set up their daily lives to minimize them. In other words, they played defense. "Look inside people's fridges—they're full of temptations," says lead researcher Wilhelm Hofmann, Ph.D., assistant professor of behavioral science at the University of Chicago. Leftover Chinese, Ben & Jerry's, cans of Coke? Toss it all and don't buy it again. There—now your willpower can get some rest at home.

Stay alert

Want to make smart choices? Go to bed early. "Willpower is lower when you're sleepy," says Kelly Glazer Baron, Ph.D., a clinical health psychologist at Northwestern University who specializes in behavioral sleep medicine. The average night owl consumes an additional 248 calories more each day than someone who goes to bed earlier, and most of those extra calories tend to be racked up after 8 p.m., according to 2011 research published in the journal Obesity.

Short night of sleep? Pour a cup of coffee and add a packet of real sugar—not Splenda or some other artificial sweetener. A 2010 Spanish study revealed that the combination of caffeine and sugar increased cognitive performance in the bilateral parietal cortex and left prefrontal cortex regions. These are two areas of the brain that support your ability to stay focused and goal-oriented when confronted with tempting distractions.

Scare yourself

It's easy to rationalize and convince yourself that one more plate of sliders won't make a difference to your waistline. To fuel your resolve, try taking the opposite approach—tell yourself a tall tale. A University of Texas study published in the Journal of Consumer Research found that exaggerating the number of calories in a favorite food—a tactic called "counteractive construal"--can help you override those temptations.

That hot, slender girl who recoils from pizza? She's onto something. Overestimating the impact of a gut bomb can help establish a clear, direct link between "bad food" and "being out of shape." Imagining that a cheeseburger contains 2,000 calories can prompt you to start picturing yourself with an extra 20 pounds. And that will help you say no. (Can't frighten yourself?

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