You probably use cooking oils more than you realize. Whether you are cooking eggs, grilled cheese sandwiches, or just stir frying vegetables, you are probably using at least a teaspoon or two of cooking oil. This adds up pretty quickly, and this is why you want to make sure that you are using healthy cooking oils.
Even if you are not overweight and otherwise not concerned about your health, by switching to healthy cooking oils you will be doing yourself a huge favor. You can’t even taste the difference between the regular cooking oils that you are probably used to using and the healthy cooking oils, so what is the big deal?
Heart healthy cooking is very important these days, what with the fatty, deep fried foods that are all so readily available to us.
The Selection
So you may not be aware of just which oils are considered as being healthy cooking oils. It is important to weigh up each cooking oil and take a look at it from all sides to determine which is going to be the healthiest. There is canola oil for one, which is low in saturated fats and rich in monosaturated fats.
Canola oil is very low in fat and good for the heart, so it should be one of your main cooking oils. There is also the extra virgin olive oil which is quite commonly used, and this should also be a staple in your kitchen when it comes to cooking oils. This oil is also rich in monosaturated fats and contains phytochemicals that may help to lower blood cholesterol levels, so it is actually good for you.
Then there are various other types of cooking oils that you can consider as well, such as the macadamia nut oil, sesame oil and soybean oil. Each of these offers its own benefits, and they are all about equal in terms of health, so you can leave it up to your own personal taste.
Remember, switching to healthy cooking oils is only one thing on the almost endless list of things that you can do to improve your health. Ever thing that you can do for your health, no matter how seemingly small will make a difference in the end and you need to remember this.
Also keep in mind that no matter what changes you make to your diet and how healthy you may be eating, if you are not exercising on a regular basis you are not going to be able to get in the shape that you want.
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Today, June 10th, is National Iced Tea Day. Now I drink iced tea year round, but I know in some places it’s only served in the summer time. Well, it’s summertime in the states — everyone here should be ready to enjoy iced tea!
So why not try healthy iced tea when you’re thirsty instead of reaching for a soft drink? The benefits of iced tea make it a better choice, especially as compared to the chemicals and massive amounts of sugar or artificial sweeteners in most soft drinks.
Healthy Tea Is A Super Health Food
Besides tasting good and being so refreshing on hot summer days, tea is a super health food! True tea is made from the leaves, stems and buds of the Camellia sinensis plant. It doesn’t matter if you prefer black, green, white or oolong tea, they all come from this same bush. The only differences are when the leaves are picked and how they are processed.
- Green Tea: made from leaves that are dried right after harvesting.
- Oolong Tea: leaves are fermented for a short time after harvest.
- Black Tea: leaves are fermented fora longer time than oolong.
- White Tea: leaves are shielded from the sun so they don’t produce any chlorophyll.
Although we call drinks made of such things as peppermint and other herbs tea, technically those are tisanes. I don’t think many people use that term these days though, but just use the word “tea” for both genuine tea and herbal tisanes.
Fields Of Green Tea
The Most Healthy Iced Tea Is Made With Green Tea
To make green tea, freshly harvested tea leaves are lightly steamed, rolled, then spread out and dried with hot air or fried until they are crisp. This produces a flavor close to the fresh leaf.
Because it undergoes the least amount of processing, green tea has the most antioxidant polyphenols. The most important of these is EGOG, epigallocatechin-3-gallate. Quite a mouthful, isn’t it? This polyphenol is believed to be responsible for most of the health benefits of iced tea.
So What Are Some Of The Benefits Of Iced Tea?
Not only does iced tea do a great job of quenching your thirst, it’s full of flavonoids called catechins, which are great antioxidants. Though these are most abundant in green teas, they are found in other teas as well.
The antioxidants in tea are thought to:
- help prevent cancer,
- reduce the risk of heart disease,
- promotes fat loss,maintain bone density,
- increases exercise endurance,
- boosts insulin activity, and
- helps older people keep mentally sharp.
That’s lots of good reasons to drink healthy iced tea!
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