Spices

I don't know why but today I am reminded of my trip to Morroco.

The Spice market in Morocco was a sight. I am reminded of Dates stuffed with almonds and a particular spice mix called Ras El Hanout.

Spices used are cinnamon,ginger,black pepper and nutmeg. Add a few threads of saffron and the spice mix is ready,

A popular recipe of this spice mix calls for m

 Few saffron threads

Salt

1tsf ground ginger

1 tsf ground turmeric

1/2 tsf ground allspice

1/2 tsf ground nutmeg

1/2 tsf ground cinnamon

1/2 tsf fresh grounds ground black pepper.

Morroco reminds me of chickpeas, and Tagine a special cooking utensil so attractive I had to buy one as a souvenir.

Rose oil

I was fortunate to visit first hand the original roseoil factory in Bulgaria.My nephew married a beautiful Bulgarian girl and we were invited to the wedding.

We reached Sophia, first and then took a taxi ride to Kazanluc,Bulgaria.itis about 2 to 3 hours car ride from Sophia.The scenery from Sophia to Kazanluk is  just beautiful.

Our hosts had planned a trip for us to see the original Bulgarian rose oil factory.

Yes, we had to purchase gifts from Rosa damascena.

I will tell you in details benefits of rose oil but most immediately that comes to mind that smelling the rose essentil oil can reduce anxiety and performance anxiety prior to sexual relation in regards to performance or stress.

Eat more fruits and veggies

I am always partial to being vegetarian and always looking for ways to convince my patients to increase their consumption of fruits and vegetables.

Well, just today I came across two articles,

The most recent one in British Medical journal which stated increased consumption of fruits and vegetables keep blues away.This study was done at the Warwick medical school and hospital.

Another study published recently by Jacksonville Florida hospital and community health clinic reveals

Eating plant based diets helps in reducing obesity and cardiovascular risk factors.

I am reminded of a song put out specially to encourage children to eat healthy at the initiative of Michelle Obama.

"You are what you eat from your head down to your feet so keep it fresh and clean and eat your broccoli."

The whole song easily downloadable on youtube.

Brown bag lunches

I remember making a brown bag peanut butter and jelly sandwich for my son all the time. He would ask me to make double or triple sandwiches so he could share with his classmates homemade lunch.I would always add a fruit like banana, apple or Grapes and he would buy milk from school.

It is called Brown Bag Bragging.

It is interesting that I was talking to a patient of mine to start brown bagging for their children and grandchildren when I came across article from another medical colleague,Dr.Ingrid Kohlstadt MD,MPH.

In medicine,we have used brown bags for calming a hyperventilating patient. Re-breathing can normalize a blood chemistry.Without planning for a lunch people find themselves eating junk or skipping lunch.

Dr.Kohlstadt has produced a field guide for Brown paper bag refueling rescue.

It is called PickNic2014 and access at www.ingridients.com/ publications

PickNic stands for Pick Nutritious Ingredients Cost effectively.

It is a list of 100 best Brown Bag lunch ideas.

More to come on this topic

The patient is the boss

Hello everybody,

In medicine we are always learning from our peer physicians.

I have been following Dr.David Katz M.D who studied Internal medicine and Preventive medicine and then headed a residency program that combined both and trained further residents.

He says:

No matter how many prescriptions you write or what advice you give to patient unless he is convinced that "he wants to make a change and be healthy", everything stays in the book, just like excellent medical records from all specialties that "examine every system and create a 10 page EMR note.

To reduce cost of medicine we now hire PAs and NPs and scribes and computer savvy staff so that we satisfy the appropriate authorities to make the book of medial record superb "5 star" rated medical records.

Coming to the point, in 1993, state of the art article was published in JAMA,that the incidence of chronic disease is reduced if we eat well, exercise and don't smoke.The article talked about the real causes of death in USA. People need skill power and willpower to achieve .

Dr.Katz states it's like sandbagging a levee if the patient is convicted that sugar is present in pretzel, tomato sauce, pizza sauce, breads and that they will read the label before buying.

They will reduce frequency of eating out and eat fresh home cooked meal.This is adding another sand bag to the levee.

I feel eat the smaller salad plate for dinner and fill it with 3/4th vegetable and or salad and rest 1/4th with lentils, beans or a protein .

It should help reduce BMI and reduce incidence of heart disease.

His site is www.DrKatz.com

Mango pudding

We loved eating at a Buddhist vegetarian resturant in Houston,Texas on westheimer.It was more of a Vegan place.I loved the Mango pudding and I stumbled upon the recipe.

The mango can be interchanged with any other fruit.

Well it's easy,
Use packet of soft tofu,with its water still to be drained over for about 20 to 30 minutes? Add  two cut up mangoes,tsf of agave syrup and blend.use some Marie biscuits that absorb and swell up when put in.and make layers of blended mango tofu and cookies and leave in refrigerator for a while and it's ready for desert.
Now,as the mango season is almost over, you can still use strawberries, or nectarines,peaches or any fruit to make this.
Enjoy!

Basic tomato sauce recipe

This is what I sent my kids to try,home made and delicious marinara sauce.

I know my kids love pasta and the Dave's are culinary chefs in the making so I am sharing a interesting home made recipe for tomato sauce.
As I learnt from my research on veggie wisdom highest lycopene is present in canned tomatoes and cooking tomatoes increases lycopene content.
So, you can take a big can of tomatoes and add to it about 2 tablespoonful of tomato paste and then add fresh basil ,salt and pepper to taste.
Adding some Extravirgin olive oil ,garlic or caramel zed onions increase the taste.
Basically in a big stainless steel pot you can cook these ingredients over 20 minutes on low heat or in a slow cooker on hi heat over3 hours.
Caramelization of onions is done separately in warmed up olive oil adding chopped onions till they become glistening,and then add to the tomato sauce.
This is our marinara sauce.
Luv,mom

Oils

Vow!we all love fried foods.

Talk about French fries,or onion rings or donuts or chips or stirfries.

Do you think everybody uses good healthy oils for this cooking?

Did you know if you deep fried some foods and there was oil left in your fry pan ,you should discard it.

Never reuse heated oil again and again in cooking.

The question comes as to which oil is good?

When I am in grocery store I have so many choices and so many brands and so many sizes, my tendency would be to buy the biggest bottle with the least price.After all oil is oil.

Well, I am wrong.It does matter what oil you use in cooking.

Let us see which are the best oils,

Extra virgin olive oil tops the list if you don't have to do extreme high temperature cooking.

My research shows that this Extravirgin olive oil is best quality if it has a sediment and greenish in appearance and is unfiltered.

Coconut oil has been used in India for a long time and health benefits are just surfacing now.It has the healthy medium chain triglycerides,MCT.

Red palm oil is healthy.

Ghee or clarified butter is healthy.

Avocado oil is healthy.

Sesame oil is healthy.

Certain oils are outright not good for you,specially unsafe for any heat exposure.

These are,

Corn oil

Soybean oil

Sunflower oil 

Safflower oil

Flax oil

Pumpkin seed oil.

Remember trans fats got so popular as they increased shelf life of products ,till their effects on heart health were uncovered.Remember those Twinkies or powdered donuts that could stay in our hand bags for days and still look and taste fresh.a These Transfats are banned now.

Remember there was a time when we were told,margarines were good for health.Margarines and Crisco shortening are hydrogenated and not healthy.

Grab and Go Braekfast Smoothie

It is a very easy recipe.

In your blender add one banana, yogurt, muesli, honey, flax meal and ice..

Blend it away.

If it is too thick, add some cold water.

Try Parfait with granola, topped with yogurt and topped with blueberries or raspberries.

Rheumatoid Arthritis and Prevotella Copri Bacteria

This note was published in Huffington post and is very interesting that new diagnosed patients with Rheumatoid arthritis had increased amounts of  Prevotella Copri bacteria in stools compared to patients who are being treated already with medications.

For the new study, published in the journal eLife, researchers obtained 44 fecal DNA samples from people newly diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis who had not yet received immune-suppressive treatments, in addition to 26 fecal DNA samples from people with treated rheumatoid arthritis. They also collected 16 fecal DNA samples from people with psoriatic arthritis and 28 fecal DNA sample from healthy people. They conducted gene sequencing on the 16S gene of these samples.

P. copri bacteria was found in the most fecal samples from the newly diagnosed patients, with 75 percent of the samples carrying the bacteria. Meanwhile, 21.4 percent of the samples from the healthy people carried the bacteria, 11.5 percent of samples from the people with treated rheumatoid arthritis carried it, and 37.5 percent of samples from people with psoriatic arthritis carried it.

As to why people with chronic, treated rheumatoid arthritis experienced lower levels of this bacteria in their stool samples, "it could be that certain treatments help stabilize the balance of bacteria in the gut," study researcher Jose U. Scher, M.D., director of the Microbiome Center for Rheumatology and Autoimmunity at NYU Langone Medical Center's Hospital for Joint Diseases, said in the statement. "Or it could be that certain gut bacteria favor inflammation."

Fermented foods

Have you seen in your grocery store shopping foods like Miso,Kimchi,Sauerkraut,yogurt,kombucha,kefir.

These contain good bacteria called probiotics.

Eating these foods increase diversity of gut microbes which is health promoting.

Gut bacteria produce hundreds of different neurotransmitters and may be a big source of serotonin.

Our gut is the second Brain as the great Vagus nerve is the major communication highway that stretches from brain to various points along intestinal lining.

 Have you heard of bacteria called Prevotella Copri?there may be association of this bacteria in the gut and Rheumatoid arthritis.Dr.Dan Littman M.D of NYU did some special studies to come to this conclusion.

"Cancer Cutting" Curcurmin Chili

I am still not done about Curcumin.

There is so much information.

I have great patient feedback too with improvement using these supplements.I am now going to tell about Curcumin and cancer prevention.

According to their mode of action, chemopreventive agents (chemicals that prevent damage to our cells) are classified into different subgroups: anti-proliferatives, antioxidants, or carcinogen-blockers. Curcumin belongs to all three, given its multiple mechanisms of action.

Other spices that have anti-inflammatory response are cloves, ginger and rosemary.

Remember these spices even if consumed in regular forms like 1/4 tsf of cloves or daily garlic in foods or a pinch of Rosemary can have these therapeutic effects.

Now talking about some simple ways to incorporate spices in diet specially Curcumin.

Chili is a favorite American food. How about a vegetarian version?

Recipe:

Components to use and throw them together and it turns out tone a good meal.

A can of crushed tomatoes

A can of black beans or red kidney beans

Vegetables to include are,

A cup of cooked corn,

Cup of chopped celery

Cup of chopped green or/and red or orange bell peppers

1/8 cup of olives green or black

1 cup of chopped onion

2 or 3 small garlic cloves

1/4 cup plain low fat yogurt1/4 cup chopped chives

1/4 cup of cleaned and chopped cilantro

1/4 cup or 1/2 pf avocado

Celtic sea salt

1 tsf of turmeric

1 tsf of black pepper

In a stainless steel 3 quart cooking pot or soup pot mix canned tomato,onion garlic beans bell peppers salt, turmeric,black pepper and let it cook till mixture is boiling.

Add corn avocado, olives garnish with plain yogurt and chives and cilantro.

Now some may say is it really chili? Without the ground beef?

We'll textures soy protein granules make the best substitute.Shredded cheddar cheese on chili is a good garnish

I read somewhere a modified recipe which uses canned tomatoes, canned beans ,

Onion, garlic and top it with cut up greens like spinach and kale and cover the pot while cooking .the tender greens get cooked fast and are delicious.

Nalini Dave

Meat consumption and dementia

I am a member of PCRM i.e Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

As per Dr. Neal Barnard,a study revealed that people who ate meat as their main source of protein were 3 times as likely to develop dementia as their vegetarian counterparts.

A subsequent survey of the medical literature on diet and Alzheimer's was titled LOSING YOUR MIND for the sake of a burger.

We know of the strong correlation between meat consumption and Heart Disease,and Meat consumption and colon cancer and meat consumption and premature death.

So what are some healthy brain foods?

Walnuts

Pecans

Almonds

Sunflower seeds 

Sesame seeds

Green leafy vegetables,foliage from where this name comes from.

Beans

Bananas

Blueberries

Don't blame Fat

I was reading Time magazine and the cover page of June 23 rd 2014 issue talks about "eat Butter".

It reads "for decades it has been the most vilified nutrient in the American diet, but now new science reveals fat isn't what's hurting our health. There was a time when eating Margarine was healthy,

Nonfat ranch dressings were popular.

Thank twice before eating Margarine!!!

Do not eat these foods

Copper comes from liver,shellfish,lobster,crab,shrimp,copper piped and Multivitamins.

IF you read on the label copper  as an added ingredient of this multivitamin ,or iron added as the multivitamin,then skip that particular multivitamin.

New ways to detect cancer

I am very interested in genetics.as you all know,we are already doing specialized testing for neurotransmitters and cyp450 enzyme activity in office to know how you metabolize medications,

I wanted to share something very interesting!

Imagine a bra that you (or ladies you know) could purchase over the counter and wear for one day to screen for breast cancer. This bra would be lined with temperature sensors that monitor variants indicative of cancer. It would not emit radiation or squish sensitive parts like a mammogram. Even women with dense breast tissue could count on reliable results.

This exact invention by First Warning Systems is slated for clinical testing to determine its efficacy. “It’s a very novel, very promising technology,” says Joshua Ellenhorn, an expert in surgical oncology and a clinical professor of surgery at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. Ellenhorn is leading the trial.

For the trial, women who have an abnormal mammogram will wear the bra prior to receiving the traditional course of diagnosis and treatment, starting with a biopsy. The sensors inside the bra will collect temperature data, which will be transmitted either wirelessly or manually to a computer or device. The digital database diagnosis will then be compared with the diagnosis from the mammogram and biopsy. Only 20 percent of women with abnormal mammograms are diagnosed with malignant tumors, and this study will test the device’s accuracy at pinpointing that 20 percent.

“This is entirely new technology. There really isn’t anything like it,” Ellenhorn says. He and the company’s leaders are waiting for FDA approval to begin the trial, which they hope to complete by next summer.

“The idea that a woman could get her own home study to determine whether there’s a breast abnormality is a major advance. … Anything that makes it easier to screen for cancer, and for the particular cancers that we know that we can help, is going to be a major advance,” Ellenhorn says.

If the trial determines that this is indeed a breakthrough device, it could have implications for other forms of cancer, especially those that occur near the skin’s surface.

The development of devices like this mark a turn toward more personalized medicine. While routine home visits are a thing of the past, and while paperwork and clunky policies make it impossible to drop in for a doctor to quickly examine a symptom, mobile devices are ushering healthcare into a more patient-focused era.

Nalini Dave

Brain health

Reducing risk for dementia/ Alzeimers

Age is a main risk factor

Genetics is another main risk factor.

Heart health and general wellness have been linked to dementia too.

So to reduce risk, it is suggested that

Watch your blood pressure.

Watch your cholesterol.

Maintain healthy weight.

Avoid tobacco and excess alcohol

Exercise your brain as well as your body.

Very berry smoothie

Berry smoothie

1 1/2 cup almond milk or rice milk

1 1/2 cup of mixed berries

1 tablespoonful of protein powder

1 tablespoonful of almond butter

2 tsf of ground flax seeds.

Adding honey specially Manuka honey makes it more delicious.