1. Cucumbers contain most of the vitamins you need every day: Vitamin B1, Vitamin B2, Vitamin B3, Vitamin B5, Vitamin B6, Folic Acid, Vitamin C, Calcium, Iron, Magnesium, Phosphorus, Potassium and Zinc.

2. Feeling tired in the afternoon, put down the caffeinated soda and pick up a cucumber.  Being a good source of B vitamins and carbohydrates, cucumbers can provide that quick pick-me-up that can last for hours.

3. Tired of your bathroom mirror fogging up after a shower? Try rubbing a cucumber slice along the mirror, it will eliminate the fog and provide a soothing, spa-like fragrance.

4. Are grubs and slugs ruining your planting beds? Place a few slices in a small pie tin and your garden will be free of pests all season long. The chemicals in the cucumber react with the aluminum to give off a scent undetectable to humans but drive garden pests crazy and make them flee the area.

5. Looking for a fast and easy way to remove cellulite before going out or to the pool? Try rubbing a slice or two of cucumbers along your problem area for a few minutes, the phytochemicals in the cucumber cause the collagen in your skin to tighten, firming up the outer layer and reducing the visibility of cellulite. Works great on wrinkles too!!!

6.. Want to avoid a hangover or terrible headache? Eat a few cucumber slices before going to bed and wake up refreshed and headache free. Cucumbers contain enough sugar, B vitamins and electrolytes to replenish essential nutrients the body lost, keeping everything in equilibrium, avoiding both a hangover and headache!!

7. Looking to fight off that afternoon or evening snacking binge? Cucumbers have been used for centuries and often used by European trappers, traders and explorers for quick meals to thwart off starvation.

8. Have an important meeting or job interview and you realize that you don’t have enough time to polish your shoes? Rub a freshly cut cucumber over the shoe, its chemicals will provide a quick and durable shine that not only looks great but also repels water.

9. Need a  WD40 substitute and to fix a squeaky hinge? Take a cucumber slice and rub it along the problematic hinge, and voila, the squeak is gone!

10. Stressed out and don’t have time for massage, facial or visit to the spa? Cut up an entire cucumber and place it in a boiling pot of water, the chemicals and nutrients from the cucumber with react with the boiling water and be released in the steam, creating a soothing, relaxing aroma that has been shown the reduce stress in new mothers and
college students during final exams.

11. Just finish a business lunch and realize you don’t have gum or mints? Take a slice of cucumber and press it to the roof of your mouth with your tongue for 30 seconds to eliminate bad breath, the phytochemcials will kill the bacteria in your mouth responsible for causing bad breath.

12. Looking for a ‘green’ way to clean your faucets, sinks or stainless steel? Take a slice of cucumber and rub it on the surface you want to clean, not only will it remove years of tarnish and bring back the shine, but is won’t leave streaks and won’t harm you fingers or fingernails while you clean.

13. Using a pen and made a mistake? Take the outside of the cucumber and slowly use it to erase the pen writing, also works great on crayons and markers that the kids have used to decorate the walls!!

Pass this along to everybody you know who is looking for better and safer ways to solve life’s everyday problems.

Excuse me, got to pop down to the supermarket to buy a trolley-full of cucumbers!

“I came across a study done on MSG (monosodium glutamate) and HVP (hydrolysed vegetable protein) a while back when I was trying to find out exactly what HVP is. I was pretty shocked to discover that a whole range of flavors used in health foods and vegetarian alternatives actually contain high amounts of MSG, which is a potent neurotoxin, but are listed under different names so we don’t realize what it is we’re eating.

“More shocking still is the lack of awareness of the people in health food stores selling this stuff buy the lorry load, and people supposedly knowledgeable about their health, yet eating tonnes of this stuff.”

Click here for the MSG study Charlie discovered, and for those of you who would like more information on MSG, check out this page. (But be warned, it’s pretty scary reading.)

National Watercress Week

When spring is in the air, it must be time for National Watercress Week (16th – 23rd May 2010).  So celebrate the UK’s most historic salad leaf and give your body a spring clean by adding this nutritious and delicious original superfood to your diet.

A unique source of plant compounds, watercress is so much more than a ‘bit on the side’. Watercress contains 15 essential vitamins and minerals. With more vitamin C than oranges, more calcium than milk and more iron than spinach, watercress is low in fat and very versatile. It also contains beta-carotene, Vitamin A equivalents and antioxidants.

Brimming with essential vitamins and useful antioxidants, watercress can help maintain our body’s all over health and banish harmful toxins leaving you looking and feeling great. Incredibly versatile, you can use it in anything from soups and sandwiches, to salads and stir-fries. Check out the watercress recipes published here.

These days watercress has become so fashionable, it even has a whole festival dedicated to it.  Now in its 7th year, the annual Watercress Festival takes place in the beautiful Georgian town of Alresford on Sunday 16th May 2010.

Gram for gram, watercress contains more vitamin C than oranges, more calcium than milk, more iron than spinach and more folate than bananas. Research also shows it is an important player in the field of cancer prevention.

Its health giving properties have been known since ancient times and the herbalist Culpepper claimed that ‘watercress potage is a good remedy to cleanse the blood in spring and consume the gross humours winter hath let behind.’  So take a leaf out of his book and make sure you include watercress in your diet this spring.

Watercress could also help to maintain good eye health, as it contains lutein and zeaxanthin, which recently published research has shown, may slow the development of age-related macular degeneration.

If you need more recipe ideas than the ones on my blog visit www.watercress.co.uk where you will find a wide list of recipes to suit all occasions.  Whether you’re looking for a filling soup, a simple snack, a nutritious sandwich or an impressive dinner party dish, there are hundreds of recipes to choose from.

If you’re lacking inspiration for feeding the family, a new recipe booklet will be available in National Watercress Week, featuring a range of simple, healthy, nutritious watercress meals which will please the whole family, as well as your bank balance.

So when you’re doing the spring cleaning, don’t just stop at the kitchen cupboards and under the stairs.  Treat your body to a spring clean and make sure you include watercress – the original superfood.

Check out these straightforward nutrition guidelines in the Iowa Newton Daily News.

It really stands alone as an interesting article, but noteworthy because it packs so much common-sense into such a few words. Healthy eating needn’t be complicated or expensive when you stick with the basic principles of this article.

Please accept with my compliments

• A free information sheet on magnesium and health
• Free information on good dietary sources of magnesium

Don’t forget to watch the video below, and enjoy making an Avocado Smoothie.

You can find more great information from Anton Leyland at: http://www.smoothiechefsecrets.com/

Watercress

Although a number of studies have shown that watercress is a rich source of chemical compounds that can exert anti-cancer activity in experimental settings, it remains unclear whether normal dietary intake of watercress can impact on the development of cancers.

Watercress contains 15 essential vitamins and minerals. With more vitamin C than oranges, more calcium than milk and more iron than spinach, watercress is low in fat and very versatile. It also contains beta-carotene, Vitamin A equivalents and antioxidants.

The study, led by Graham Packham, Professor of Molecular Oncology at the University of Southampton, involves a dozen breast cancer survivors eating 80g of watercress before providing a series of blood samples.

Scientists determine the levels of watercress- derived chemical compounds in the blood samples and whether potential anti-cancer pathways are activated in the blood cells of the volunteers.  Clinical aspects are being overseen by Mr Dick Rainsbury, Director of the Winchester and Andover Breast Unit at the Royal Hampshire County Hospital, working closely with Senior Research Dietician, Babara Parry.

An exciting discovery of this research has been the elucidation of a mechanism by which watercress derived chemical compounds interfere with cancer promoting pathways. Graham Packham’s team have shown that PEITC, the main compound responsible for watercress anti cancer properties, prevents that accumulation of a key protein within cancer cells when cells are exposed to low levels of oxygen.  This protein can act to drive the development of a new blood supply to growing tumours and inhibition of this pathway might contribute to the potential anti-cancer effects of PEITC.

The £100,000 project has been funded by The Watercress Alliance, made up of Vitacress Salads, Bakkavör and The Watercress Company. It follows research, carried out by the University of Ulster, Coleraine, and published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition in February 2007 which found that watercress increased the ability of cells to resist DNA damage caused by free radicals and that daily intake of watercress significantly reduced levels of DNA damage found in blood cells. DNA damage is considered to be an important trigger in the early stages of cancer.

Dr. Steve Rothwell, of The Watercress Alliance, commented: “We are hoping to build on the body of research which supports the idea that watercress may have an important role to play in limiting cancer cell development.  It is quite fitting that the study is being carried out in an area which is at the centre of watercress production.”

References:

As always, in our quest for healthy living, prevention is better than cure, and I am pleased to present you with a free ebook “Back Pain Explained”.

You’ll read many simple precautions for avoiding back pain, and to relieve it. You will also find the 3 best exercises you can do to prevent back problems; they are simple and take just minutes.

Please use the “sharing” link below to pass this ebook onto any back-pain sufferers you know.

If your body is not in the healthy range of the acid to alkaline spectrum, you may be experiencing, or at risk of developing,  some of the following symptoms:

• Weight gain or weight loss
• Bladder / kidney problems
• Poor immune system
• Aching joints and muscles
• Hormone imbalance
• Lack of energy
• Indigestion and / or constipation
• Yeast or fungal problems

Why has our pH balance, and hence our health, deteriorated so badly over recent years?

• Many people don’t eat a healthy diet
• Modern farming methods lead to imbalances and deficiencies in the correct minerals in the soil
• Foods are sprayed with toxic chemicals and pesticides
• “Fresh” food often isn’t fresh, and may have been stored for months
• Farmed foods (e.g. farmed salmon) may have additives injected to appear the correct colour
• Airborne pollution – the UK has one of the highest rates of asthma in the world

What can we do to correct the pH imbalance?

• Eat as healthy a diet as possible – given the above restrictions
• Use good quality nutritional supplements to “fill in” the gaps left by our modern diet
• Make sure that your bodily excretory systems are working well (bladder, colon) by drinking plenty of water and eating a fibre rich diet
• Ensure your liver is correctly functioning to excrete toxins from the body

Learn more about an Acid/Alkaline balancing diet below.

Anyway – watch out for the next offer, there were so many “goodies” on offer free of charge that I’ll certainly participate in any more that happen.

———————- Below, you can read what you missed, to whet your appetite for next time.

Something a bit different today. In conjunction with a couple of colleagues of mine, Carolyn Hansen and Reed Floren, I am pleased to bring you what I hope will be the first of a series of Health Giveaway events.

A group of us have collaborated to bring you a range of gifts that I hope you’ll enjoy.

Click here for some of the great gifts on offer. Specifically, over 150 different products, books, and programs for FREE! There has to be something of interest for you, so hurry over and check it out.