Solitude

Want to make cooking easier and more enjoyable? Try these fun and surprising tricks I found in my foodie travels this week, from my two favorite new (and still under-the-radar!) sites. 1. YouTube it with experts. Why cook and screw up when you can learn from the chefs themselves?  Newcomer ChefDay (A fun start-up that delivers pre-measured fresh ingredients you need to cook chef-designed recipes) features step-by-step tutorial videos with chefs walking you through the recipes.  (Stri-fried Green Bean Vermicelli or Parmesan Veal Milanese, anyone?) Most dishes take around 30 minutes total to prepare, and they’re sorted by level of difficulty to make things easier for even the most amateur chefs. 2. Get creative about salt substitutes. I always thought the only swap for salt was, well, saltless salt. Until now. In talking with Sodium Girl Jessica Goldman Foung, my eyes were opened to a slew of awesome alternatives. Did you know...

Here are a few health myths that need to be broken.   All nuts and oily seeds have cholesterol No plant food contains cholesterol because cholesterol is manufactured only by animals. So all nuts and oil seeds are cholesterol-free. Low-fat margarine is healthy because it has no cholesterol Several brands of margarine carry transfats that are much worse for the body. Transfats can raise cholesterol levels in the body and spoil liver functions. So it is better to eat natural butter – in small quantities. All oils contain cholesterol Any oil made from plants is always naturally cholesterol-free. If we eat cholesterol, it will raise our blood cholesterol Any rise in the body’s cholesterol level depends on how the liver is able to process it.   Milk is a complete food Mother’s milk is a complete food for a baby till it is six months old. After that, the child needs additional foods, though mother’s milk can be continued as long as the mother is comfortable. Milk from...

I think of death twice daily: Soon after my wake-up time in the morning and after taking stock of the day’s work, before going to bed at night.  This reminds me of the reality of life and how to make every day worthwhile and meaningful . This also makes one ponder over the intensity and pain of the fear and feeling of death. In turn, one tends to be humble and reasonable in one’s way of life, besides making one look for ways as to how to overcome it or minimise its fear. One can say there are many ways to defeat the fear of death. Since death is as sure as sunset, what is the use of getting scared of it? Since you are aware that death will come and you are not aware of the permanence of life through pure consciousness, you are always scared of death. Liberation from the scare of death involves several steps. Or, in a simpler way, one can say there are several ways. We can go through the three more practical and obvious ones. First, there is no escape from death and hence one can ...

Meditation has been established as a powerful tool for ushering in peace of mind and putting an end to stress and related maladies like tension headaches, premature ageing and chronic fatigue syndrome If there is one thing that can travel faster than the speed of light, it is the human mind. From dawn to dusk, a jumble of chaotic thoughts crowd our subconscious, demanding our time and attention. This can affect the health and peace of mind. Promoting healing In simplistic terms, meditation is a kind of conscious relaxation—an inner journey towards calmness and tranquillity. According to information released by the Meditation Society of America, regular sessions can improve one’s I.Q., foster creativity and imagination; reduce blood pressure while promoting clear thinking and healing emotional scars and balance. Meditation does not have to have spiritual or religious implications, nor even any rigid rules. Though there are different techniques, the American  Journal of Health Prom...

The weight loss industry grows at six per cent a year and yet the incidence of obesity also increases by six per cent every year! Obviously something is not working. To make matters worse, we are deafened by a cacophony of conflicting dietary advice from the Cookie Diet to the Cabbage Soup Diet and everything in between. If you’ve found it hard to maintain or lose weight, you need to go beyond the familiar “diet and exercise” mantra. There are three hidden causes for the obesity epidemic. 1. The “Overfed / Undernourished” Syndrome Depleted soil conditions and refining give us nutritionally bankrupt foods which fill us without nourishing us. This leads to constant hunger at the cellular level. Solution: Turn to “superfoods” such as wheat grass and alfalfa sprouts to satisfy your ‘cellular’ hunger. Voila! You will eat less and feel more satisfied without dieting! 2. The “Craving-for-Refined-Foods” Syndrome It is not the lack of will power, but undiagnosed food allergies that make you...