Cooking Smart – Cook your Way to Better Health
I am not a health food nut! I do believe that by cooking smart you can cook your way to better health. One of the benefits of getting into the kitchen as part of Cooking to Impress is that you are cooking. When you are the one preparing the meals, you are the one controlling what is in it. Cooking for yourself moves you away from fast food. There is very little fast food that is healthy. Still, when we start we often rely on components of our meal that are highly processed. While not ideal, it is a good first step. The next step for cooking smart is a move to reduce the processed foods we are using. It is really not that difficult. Cooking smart is about using the health ingredients when we can. Yes, cooking can lead to better health.
What is Cooking Smart
Cooking smart is just trying to cook a nutritional good meal. Select fresh or unprocessed frozen ingredients, instead of highly processed choices. Increase the quantity of vegetables and fruits that you eat. These days there is a big push for organic items. Yes, they are healthier for you compared to items grown with pesticides. A non-organic grown vegetable may not be as healthy as an organic version, it is still better than not having one at all.
Learn a little about Nutrition for Better Health
Many of the top colleges and universities in the world offer Massive Open Online Course (MOOC). You can take these courses for free from anywhere that you have access to the internet. There is also an option to get a certificate for a small fee. Since I have no one to impress I go for the free option.
Coursera is a site that can access many of these MOOC programs. I recently came across a program from Stanford University title Introduction to Food and Health. This course is a few years old however, it is scheduled often. I have enrolled for the next class. While the class has not started, all the material excepts the quizzes are available.
I have already completed the course material just need to wait to do the quiz. This course is impressive. I have a decent understanding of nutrition, however, I was still able to learn from this online course. The material is presented in an easy-to-understand way. Take a look at this preview.
One of the items that was reinforced for me, was that cooking for yourself is healthier than fast food. During one of the interviews in the course, the Professor being interviewed tells of a heart transplant doctor. The doctor’s final prescription for patients is a recipe for baked chicken with two more recipes for the leftovers. A start back to better health by way of smart cooking. The main presenter in the course is Maya Adam a doctor. The final section of the course has some videos in Maya’s kitchen preparing healthy simple meals.
From the Hot Tub to Better Health via Cooking Smart.
A few years ago, I came across a book titled “The Hot Tub Diet”. I really miss my hot tub, so I glanced through it. The book is not really a diet book. It is about making changes in your life that results in a better lifestyle including what and how you eat. The book is only about 100 pages, is fun to read, and has many good points. The author was in an automobile accident that resulted in her not being allowed to exercise. Her gym membership included a few hours of child care each week, so she let them watch her children and sat in the hot tub.
Over a period of weeks, she watched others as they worked out and listen to them when they also were in the hot tub. She realized that going to the gym before her injury, was counterproductive. She would work out hard, then since she was tired she stopped to get fast food on the way home. On her road to recovery, she started to walk with her children. Afterward, she would cook dinner. Cooking smart meant she prepared better meals and spent more time with her family.
