The Information Diet – Introduction to Nutrition
Check out the link below to my post and survey about my new online workshop!
https://plantbasedjenny.ca/2020/01/08/the-information-diet-introduction-to-nutrition/
The Information Diet – Introduction to Nutrition
Alright, the Christmas and New Year’s crazy is all over… maybe you enjoyed it and maybe you are happy for the normalcy and calmness to return to your life. Regardless of your outlook, life is back to normal.
Now as I stated in an earlier post if you love your normal, you eat healthy (provided you know how to eat healthy), you have lots of energy and your body and mind are fit and strong then CONGRATULATIONS! …we all want to be you
If you are putting one foot in front of the other, thinking about healthy eating, weight loss and wishing you could sleep long enough to dream about having more energy… then we ARE all you.
If you have been following my blog then you know I have made a post in the past called “The Information Diet” …if you are reading it for the first time today, go read that post, I’ll wait…
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Ok so we are all on the same page now.
My main goal as a nutritionist and the whole reason that I even decided to study nutrition is because it is so essential to life. My love for food and my inquisitive nature led me to ask what are the long term effects of this deliciousness? There is so much bad information or lack of great information out there surrounding what we eat and how to nourish our bodies. I decided to contribute to some good information being out there.
I’ve been working one-on-one with clients and I’ve seen a pattern emerging. Lack of time with me! I studied for 3 years to learn what I know now… and I continue to learn each day, following the research and learning from others in the field of nutrition and lifestyle medicine. There is just too much relevant information about food, nutrition and good habits to absorb in an hour or 2 with me. So we spend a few hours together and I make you a plan and maybe you open the email, maybe you make some of the recipes, and possibly you follow through with half the changes I have recommended. This is because your knowledge of the WHY isn’t there. You need to feel empowered, you need to feel like you are making changes and new choices for a reason and a reason that you believe in. Recently someone that I respect said to me, “how much time do your clients need to spend with you to benefit from what you have to offer?”
The answer isn’t a simple one… years probably! LOL But realistically I have decided that I can offer chunks of the information so that people that seek to benefit from me have a REAL chance of feeling the change, feeling the benefits and feeling the possibilities.
So here is the deal, government health care covers prescriptions and accidents. It doesn’t cover transformation. This is where my skill set lies.
I’m offering a 3 week course introducing you to nutrition: the fundamentals: the why. Of course information is only as powerful as what you choose to do with it BUT the single most effective weight loss study EVER was simply giving a group of people information.
Here is the link if you care to check it out https://www.nature.com/articles/nutd20173
I am offering you the chance for empowerment, control over your body, weight loss and increased energy.
I am not here to offer you my opinion, I am here to present evidence based information regarding nutritional science in an easily ‘digestible’ format 🙂
3 weeks isn’t enough to change your life but it is enough to change your gut bacteria, your blood pressure, your cholesterol and your blood sugar levels. Emotionally, change takes longer than 3 weeks, but it’s a good foundation and biologically it’s a week longer than the entire lifetime of your white blood cells.
You know when you are holding the hand of a toddler to help them up the stairs and each stair is an accomplishment. You’re so proud of them for having the courage to take that huge step in front of them and even though you’ve been up and down those steps a million times you feed off of their joy and excitement and hold their hand tightly to ensure a safe and positive experience. …and if that toddler let’s go, then it’s just you, holding tightly to their arm. The partnership is now you just dragging them up the stairs and the joy is lost for both of you.
I’m excited to spread quality information about nutrition as vastly as I can… I am excited to continue my learning process and share the spoils with you! I am excited to hold your hand and encourage and support you in your quest and journey for knowledge, health and happiness.
Are you intrigued or even slightly interested? I have included a link to a short survey below to help me understand more about how you see both the information and the delivery of the information fitting into your life.
School Lunches
I have a new page with new content!
Check out my school lunch ideas… you can access them in the “School Lunches” tab along the menu bar or you can find them in the list of Recipes 🙂
ENJOY!
Blood Work!
Unless you have been living under a rock I’m sure you have heard…
“an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”
…so get off your ass and prevent!
Part of my prevention is getting my blood work done every couple years, well at least that is my intention. I took a bit of a hiatus after all the blood work pre and post having babies but I knew it was time to check up on my insides.
There is no diet that specifically warrants you to check your blood work. We all should keep stalk of how our bodies are aging, how are immune system is doing, how the kidney’s are functioning, if the blood is fat, thin, sticky or slippery… All of these details tell us (or our doctor) how our bodies are doing and gives us a little glimpse down the tunnel of our future.
If you eat a plant-based diet your doctor will be more than happy to get you a blood test (in my experience, most are worried as soon as you tell them), which is super ironic because although you can be a junk-food-vegan, which I totally DO NOT promote, that is not considered a plant-based diet. The majority of people are eating a typical western diet and dying of typical western diet related diseases, also called lifestyle diseases. Regardless of our diet choices we have the right to request a nutritional panel be done whenever we feel the need!
I did want to proudly should from the roof tops that chemistry experiment that is my body is right on track! I can only attribute that to what I choose to put into my body on a daily basis 🙂
For anyone curious here are my numbers:
WHAT THE FLAX!
Flax seeds are one of the original medicines used by Hippocrates, I’m sure you all remember his famous quote
“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food” (oh how far we’ve strayed)
Flax seeds are a high-fiber super food! Omega-3 essential fatty acids, “good” fats that have been shown to have heart-healthy effects. Essential fatty acids are not made in our bodies but are exactly that…essential and therefore we must consume them. Each tablespoon of ground flaxseed contains about 1.8 grams of a-linolenic acid (plant oil).
There are a long list of benefits to flaxseeds, I have named a few in the following list…and really when there are ZERO negative side effects how long of a list of benefits do you really need?!
Mother Nature has provided us with an amazing nutrient but man did she ever package it tightly! Our digestive system can’t break through their tough outer hull, so we can try to carefully chew these little guys but come on…they are super tiny and most of them will just end up going in one end and out the other. Grinding them up and using them in your porridge, morning cereal, pasta sauce or mixed into a smoothie are great ways to get the benefits. You can also cook and bake with flax as their beneficial properties are NOT destroyed with heat! (yay)
Some FLAX Benefits
- increased metabolic function – supports weight loss
- lowers blood pressure
- reduce risk of cancer
- reduce inflammation
- reduce constipation
- improves insulin sensitivity
Just 2 tablespoons of flaxseeds per day just might keep the doctor away!
Pancakes… fluffy make your kids smile pancakes :)
I’ve been committed to putting oats into my pancakes for a while now and full disclosure – oats makes them very heavy. The kids were thankful for pancakes but have been wishing for light fluffy – like I used to make when I cooked with eggs – pancakes. So here you go! Now you’ll have to just risk it like I do each time since I don’t measure the amount of water that I put in. I just add little by little until I get a good consistency that drips off the whisk (you’re going for thicker than a crepe batter but not clumpy or lumpy)
Fluffy Vegan Pancakes (with no oats – kind of)
- 3 pureed bananas – the riper the sweeter so those black bananas that you save for baking will do just fine!
- 3 cups stone ground flour – it also works with 2 cups stone ground flour and 1 cup oat flour (which I make by blending my oats in the blender until they are like flour!)
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 cup ground flax
- 1/4 cup hemp hearts (optional)
- 1 cup plant milk (we use cashew milk)
- 1 tbsp baking soda & some apple cider or coconut vinegar (now what you want to do is get your tbsp of baking soda onto the spoon, hold it over your mixture and pour the vinegar in small amounts onto the baking soda to make it bubble and activate. I use 2 or 3 splashes of vinegar (you wont even taste it in the pancakes)
- Whisk it all together and start adding your water, a little at a time until you achieve that drippy but not runny pancake consistency
That’s it, heat the pan with a little avocado oil and pour the batter into whatever size pancakes your family likes – or you have the skills to flip!
ENJOY 🙂
The Devil’s in the Hairy Details
What can you even tell from a hair mineral analysis? EVERYTHING! Here is a list of just 12 of the insights that a hair mineral analysis can provide. This easy and accurate test is the WHAT and the WHY and I am the HOW 🙂 Once you get your sample taken it is important to get it accurately interpreted so that you can get the full picture of what is happening in your body and how to best approach rebalancing.
- Heavy Metal Toxicity
- Mineral Deficiencies and Imbalances
- Metabolic Rate (fast or slow)
- Adrenal Fatigue
- Thyroid Function
- Nervous System Imbalances
- Protein Synthesis
- Inflammation
- Energy Levels
- Mental Health Issues
- Liver & Kidney Stress
- Carbohydrate Tolerance & Blood Sugar Imbalances like Diabetes and Insulin resistance
Give me a call @778 676 5210 or scroll to the bottom of the page to book online 🙂
Tiny Tacos
This one was quick and easy since jackfruit comes in the can and doesn’t really need to be cooked. I just pulled apart the jackfruit and fried it a little in some sweet and tangy BBQ sauce with a handful of smashed black beans. To boost the flavour even more I added some onions, garlic and mushrooms to the frying pan. Onions and garlic are not only great for the immune system but are also powerful anti-inflammatories, lowering inflammation in your gut and throughout your body.
DID YOU KNOW: Mushrooms relax your arteries lowering your blood pressure!
We love our homemade guacamole! Avocado is rich in oleic acid – a healthy fat – and we try to consume it as much as possible — our guac is just squished avocado with some S&P, a splash of pickle juice and scoop of nutritional yeast — For the rice I always cook it in broth and often will add some cumin or coriander for added flavour. If you add the spices to the water then the rice (or any grain you cook) takes on the flavours as it’s cooking and soaking it all in.
We topped it all off with a little salsa and some fresh cilantro — cilantro is great at soaking up and naturally removing any extra heavy metals from our body.
INGREDIENTS:
- rice
- guacamole – avocado, pickle juice, nutritional yeast
- jackfruit
- black beans
- onions
- mushrooms
- garlic
- salsa
- BBQ sauce
My Road to PEMF
A fellow nutritionist introduced me to the science of Pulsed Electro-Magnetic Frequency and it just clicked for me. Our cells are responsible for our health and our energy. Healthy cellular activity is the foundation our bodies need to keep things running smoothly. As much as it made sense I didn’t really jump on board until I had my own experience.
…let’s rewind to last winter…
January 2018, I fell on an icy hill in Kyiv pulling my kids on their sled. My body tried to go down the hill and my arm and shoulder stayed attached to the sled a the top. I experienced some tiny tears in the muscle and tendons in the shoulder joint resulting in a lot of fluid build up and restricted movement…oh and PAIN!!! Despite resting, icing, heating, massaging, doctor administered injections, physiotherapy and anything else I could think of… a year later I just wasn’t gaining mobility back and would wake each night with the throbbing pain.
I JUST WANTED MY ARM BACK!
Once I heard about PEMF Therapy I literally had nothing to lose and everything to gain. Since there are no negative side effects and it is 100% safe I thought why not give it a go. Worst case scenario is I feel nothing and am in equal amount of pain but my cells are oxygenated and re-centered to the earth’s magnetic field giving them the chance to release toxins and better absorb the nutrients from my awesome diet (WFPB 😉
Now everyone’s road to recovery or pain management is different but for my personal story my life was changed in just 3 short days, yup DAYS! It had been over a year of pain and limited movement and here I was 3 days later, sleeping through the night, putting the plates on the shelf they belong and numerous other things that we all take for granted when we can use both arms freely as we choose. I did use the PEMF mat and therapy pad 3 times per day during that time as I only had a limited rental window to test it out for myself. But that was enough for me to know that not only was I not going to live without it, I wanted to be able to offer this kind of pain free rehabilitation to anyone I know or would meet.
The results of using the PEMF Therapy are cumulative so I am just getting stronger and stronger the more I am able to use it, and since having it in my home I have been able to let the rest of my family benefit from it. My son in particular has been really benefiting from the nerve calming that the therapy provides. We have noticed such a positive difference (and almost elimination) of his twitches, ticks and emotional anxiety.
There is a lot of smog out there, as a “civilized” society we are getting further and further removed from what nature has to offer us in both our food and our connection to the earth.
stay nourished, stay tuned 🙂
Our Hair is our Story
Hair Mineral Analysis is often underestimated as a powerful source of information. It measures the levels of up to 60 essential minerals and toxic metals. With correct testing and interpretation, one can construct a comprehensive metabolic profile of the human body. As hair grows it forms a permanent record of the body’s nutritional deficiencies or excesses. High levels of toxic metals inhibit the body’s ability to process and assimilate specific nutritional elements that are essential to good health and have a proven link to many types of diseases. By correcting tissue mineral levels and ratios with proper diet, supplementary nutrients and lifestyle modifications, many physical and behavioural health conditions can be prevented or reversed.
Toxic metal screening includes lead, mercury, cadmium, arsenic, nickel, and aluminum.
Minerals screened include: Trace Minerals include:
- electrolytes • copper • molybdenum
- calcium • manganese • lithium
- magnesium • chromium • cobalt
- sodium • selenium • zinc
- potassium • iron
- phosphorus
Plant Based Jenny 