What's for dinner?
http://www.organicconsumers.org/organic/newyork102703.cfm
---------------------------------
-There are over 1,000 CSAs in the US, up from zero in 1984.
-You can find a CSA near you at http://www.csacenter.org
working, serving as a testament to the problem at hand. In the US, we each work an average of 350 hours (9 weeks) more per year than our European friends. In other words, for the EU and the US to have equivalent work hours per person per year, the average American would need to take off work from October 24 until the end of the year. Although this is not an obvious food related issue, the American work schedule directly impacts how the food industry reacts to consumer demands. Longer days at the office mean more convenience foods, more eat-on-the-run foods, more fast foods, more packaging, and more preservatives. It also means less time to cook with fresh locally grown produce from co-ops, farmer's markets, CSAs, and home gardens.
---------------------------------
-Working Americans average a little over two weeks of vacation per year, while Europeans average five to six weeks.
-Take Back Your Time Day is not about being anti-work. It's about taking back time for your family, your health, and your involvement in bettering the world around you.
When you buy overpackaged or disposable items, you're essentially buying
trash.
Look for items you can use over and over again.
· Bring your own reusable shopping bag and avoid the paper versus plastic dilemma. Durable canvas or string bags for grocery shopping are light and easy to tuck into a purse or briefcase and can be used thousands of times.
· Buy in bulk. Buy the large economy size instead of the same volume in several smaller containers (for instance two-liter bottles versus six-packs).
· Buy fruits and vegetables uncut and unpackaged, a whole melon,
for example, not a halved, shrink-wrapped melon in a styrofoam container.
More Supermarket Tips at:
http://www.ProcessRequest.com/apps/redir.asp?link=XbccecefCA,YccfdhifgDI
Soy, and most soy-based products, are nutritional powerhouses. Soybeans are the only plant food that has all of the essential amino acids our body requires, making it a complete protein. Soy foods do not have any cholesterol, and most are high in fiber. Soy also has many vitamins, minerals, and phytochemical compounds (like isoflavones) that work together to create numerous health benefits. This article outlines six ways soy can improve your health.
Every 33 seconds, an American dies of heart disease. That is more than
954,000 deaths annually, more than 42 percent of all deaths every year.
In fact, since 1900 the number one killer in the United States has been
cardiovascular disease in every year but 1918.
Not surprisingly, fast food burger companies refuse to acknowledge
the impact that their diet is having on children and adults around the
world. That diet is killing us.
GENEVA, New York, January 24, 2002 (ENS) - A natural cancer fighting compound found in apples may help explain the old adage about an apple a day keeping the doctor away.
Writing in the medical journal "The Lancet," scientists from Cornell University and Seoul National University offer a more precise explanation for vitamin C's anti-cancer activity, and suggest that a natural chemical from apples works even better than vitamin C.
C.Y. Lee, Cornell professor of food science and technology, and his South Korean colleagues, Ki Won Lee, Hyong Joo Lee and Kyung-Sun Kang, found that vitamin C blocks the carcinogenic effects of hydrogen peroxide on intercellular communication. Until this finding, the mechanism for vitamin C's ability to inhibit tumor formation was not understood.
The report also notes that quercetin, a phytochemical found in apples, has even stronger anticancer activity than vitamin C. Phytochemicals, such as flavanoids and polyphenols, are plant chemicals that contain protective, disease preventing compounds.
"Vitamin C has been considered one of the most important essential nutrients in our diet since the discovery in 1907 that it prevents scurvy," said Lee. "In addition, vitamin C has several important functions in our body for the synthesis of amino acids and collagen, wound healing, metabolism of iron, lipids and cholesterol and others. In particular, vitamin C is a well known anti-oxidant that scavenges free radicals."
An anti-oxidant is one of many chemicals that prevent molecules, such as a special form of oxygen, from attaching themselves to cells. Reducing this process, known as oxidation, helps prevent cell and tissue damage from free radicals in the body.
"Vitamin C prevents the inhibition of gap junction intercellular communication (GJIC) induced by hydrogen peroxide," said Lee.
GJIC is essential for maintaining normal cell growth. Inhibition of GJIC is related to the cancer processes including the growth of tumors.
Hydrogen peroxide, a tumor promoter, inhibits GJIC by changing a special protein, connexin43. When rat liver epithelial cells were treated with vitamin C, the researchers report, inhibition of GJIC induced by hydrogen peroxide was prevented.
Although vitamin C protects against oxidative DNA damage through its free radical scavenging activity, Lee and his coworkers believe that the vitamin's anti-tumor action works through a different mechanism.
"The most powerful weapon we have in the fight against cancer is prevention," Lee concluded. "A diet rich in phytochemicals and vitamin C will reduce the risk of cancer. These phytochemicals and nutrients are most readily available in fresh fruits and vegetables."
The
report appears in the January 12 issue of "The Lancet," the weekly journal
for physicians published in London.