THE NEW WORLD

We all love to cook out on the grill - thought this UP story was worthwhile to share with everyone.

A U.S. dietitian says marinating meat before grilling helps draw out the chemical precursors of carcinogens.
Dietitian Vicki Piper of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston explains where there is smoke there is a risk of cancer. Burning meat, she says, can create carcinogens -- agents that may cause cancer.
"Grilling any type of meat -- even chicken or fish -- until it's charred or burned can increase the chances of getting cancer, according to the American Institute for Cancer Research," Piper says in a statement.
However, lowering fat is good for many reasons, including that less fat means fewer flare-ups. Pre-cooking meat indoors for a few minutes before bringing it out to the grill helps too because the higher the cooking temperatures, the more carcinogens develop.
Using barbecue briquettes and hardwood products, such as hickory and maple -- that burn at lower temperatures -- is preferable to using softwood like pine chips, Piper advises.
Keeping the grill lightly oiled, Piper suggests, helps keep charred material sticking on the grill from getting on the food. The oil also helps keep fish and chicken in one piece.
Scrubbing the grill thoroughly after every use avoids a buildup of carcinogens that can be transferred to food, Piper says.

The easiest way to deal with this is not to GRILL anything.....What a stress!!!!!!
Let me go eat my mango - oh sorry its guinep season now and like mangoes they have skin so I don`t have to soak them in peroxide and water for hours to get off herbicides and pesticides..........what a world we now live in!!!
We shouldn't grill, we shouldn't cook with olive oil or canola oil, we shouldn't eat grapes and plums etc. without soaking, baby carrots have chlorine, we shouldn't use cell phones,we shouldn't even bathe in water not purified, we shouldn't wash clothes or use dish washing liquids that have not had the carcinogens removed,everything we do has some negative effect.
We really have to be more vigilant than ever as an old time Jamaican saying goes" prevention better than cure"..........The new world has not been good for us at all, I guess it's really the good old days.....so how come we're living longer?
Supplements and modern medicine????? Or is it only certain people living longer,those of us who eat right and exercise???

Keeping it real

We die if we do, we die if we don`t - check out this info from Dr. Mercola about chlorine in your baby carrots:

"The small cocktail or “baby” carrots you buy are made using the larger crooked or deformed carrots which are put through a machine which cuts and shapes them into cocktail carrots. You might have known that already. But what you might not know is that once the carrots are cut and shaped into cocktail carrots, they are dipped in a solution of water and chlorine in order to preserve them.
When a baby carrot turns white (“white blushing”), this causes the bags of carrots to be pulled from the shelf and thrown away. To prevent this consumer waste, the carrots are dipped in chlorine to prevent the white blushing from happening.
Chlorine is a very well-known carcinogen. Organic growers instead use a citrus based, nontoxic solution called Citrox."

Does that mean that lovely flavour that I liked was chlorine?

I stopped eating them years ago as I thought they were engineered because they were so small.....ah well!
Another thing I would recommend that you totally avoid is herbs and spices that are not from 100% certified organic ingredients. Why waste your time -- and risk potential health consequences from artificial ingredients and questionable chemical processes ?
When you need to pick up herbs and spices, I would advise you to go to the Indian ayurveda store - they even mix the cumin and tumeric for you, they know what spice goes with what and you are getting the real thing, you notice the Chinese people shop in China town,.....well in India it's the same thing, most Indians don`t go buying their herbs and spices at the supermarket.
When I lived in New York I ate sushi from the restaurants that had lots of Japanese patrons..........they know their food best, so buy your herbs and spices from the people who know........... the Indians

GO GREEN !!

This posting is especially for one of my readers who asked about greens and what I use to make green juice. First of all I`ll tell you why I believe we should all have green juice daily.
For one it makes us have energy, unstoppable energy - by the way I`m speaking of live (raw) greens not cooked greens - I just went to Sumfest (the hottest reggae fest in the world for those who may not know) and I survived leaving the park at 6:30am Sunday, waking at 10 am , going to work and as I write this I haven`t slept yet and its 12:55am Monday morning...this is after working a full day Saturday with no nap.
Lack of sleep is not good but it helps if your body can withstand the onslaught every now and then..the young people flaked all around me but then they were all drinking alcohol, they decided that I`m experienced in "bleaching" and tell you the truth I AM.......even in my unhealthiest times I could bleach..been through many a Sunsplash and Sumfest but that's another story. So read and digest the following facts and recipes from some of my favourite gurus and you will realize how important greens are in creating a strong healthy body and in protecting you from serious disease.

Facts About Greens from Nomi Shannon
* Calorie for calorie dark green leafy vegetables, sea vegetables and algaes have more nutrient density that any other category of foods.
* Research shows that eating green leafy vegetables on a regular basis supports the endocrine system, the immune system and the digestive system.
* People who eat leafy greens on a regular basis are more likely to AVOID osteoporosis, fatigue and adrenal exhaustion than those that don't.
* Greens are high in protein (spinach is 48% protein), iron, zinc, calcium, and other minerals.
* The antioxidant content of greens is higher than in any other category of foods.
* In fact, the only nutrient that greens are deficient in is calories... and that's GOOD NEWS for you if you have a few extra pounds to shed.
* Consuming large quantities of greens may cause a constant state of joy and elicit uncontrollable laughter!

According to FREDERICK PATENAUDE - If you want to achieve radiant health, there is no substitution for having a good understanding of how to use greens in your diet. As the Russian proverb says: New - is something old, that has been long forgotten. I re-discovered green smoothies. What do I mean by green smoothie? Here is one of my favorite recipes: 4 ripe pears, 1 bunch of parsley and 1 big cup of water. Blended well. This smoothie looks very green, but it tastes like fruit.
Green smoothies are very nutritious. I believe that the ratio in them is optimal for human consumption: about 60% - ripe organic fruit mixed with about 40% - organic green vegetables.
Green smoothies, as opposed to juices, are a complete food because they still have fiber.
Green smoothies belong to the most palatable dishes for all humans of all ages. With a ratio of fruits to veggies as 60:40 the fruit taste dominates the flavor, yet at the same time the green vegetables balance out the sweetness of the fruit, adding nice zest to it. Green smoothies are simply the best tasting dishes for the majority of adults and children. I always make extra smoothie and offer it to my friends and customers. Some of them eat a standard American diet. They all finish their big cup of green smoothies with complements. They are quite surprised that something so green could taste so nice and sweet.
By consuming two or three cups of green smoothies daily you will consume enough of greens for the day to nourish your body, and they will be well assimilated. Many people do not consume enough of greens, even those who stay on a raw food diet. The molecule of chlorophyll has only one atom that makes it different from a molecule of human blood.
According to teachings of Dr. Ann Wigmore, to consume chlorophyll is like receiving a healthy blood transfusion.
Victoria Boutenko's "Green for Life" is the Bible for those of you that need to know more about greens.In this book, Victoria, a natural health leader in the raw food world, explains a specific study that she directed to explain the power of changing just one thing in your own diet.She took 40 or so people of all ages who were eating a regular diet (or Standard American Diet) and asked them to only change one simple thing about their daily eating habits.
Each one of them was to replace one meal with a green smoothie.
A green smoothie is a fruit smoothie with leafy greens added to it like spinach or kale (Or whatever else you like!). This gives a significant boost to the mineral content of any fruit smoothie!
The other benefit of a green smoothie is that you can get all those great healthy minerals and phytonutrients into your body and the drink still tastes GOOD !
So after just a few short weeks, something pretty remarkable started to happen.
Some of their symptoms of ill health started to disappear. Some of them started to wake up earlier (and in better moods!), some reported better sexual performance, others (most) said their energy levels skyrocketed, some even had rashes disappear.
All this and more in just a few weeks, just replacing one thing in their diets.

SO AS YOU CAN SEE THERE ARE MANY TAKES ON IT. One thing everybody agrees though is it tastes good and is good for you. Whether you are juicing or making smoothies.......
I make mine with sweet pepper and kale ( if available ) spinach, pak choy (the green leaf not the white part that's where the waste is stored ) any green vegetable, add ginger, add celery, add garlic, add cilantro and parsley, you name it you can add it and use an apple to sweeten or cane juice. My favourite is straight cho cho juice..... there are a variety of juices but the important thing is to do it, not once a week either, you are to have it at least once per day.
So starting today - green-up your diet - your immune system will work as it should , you will look better - long and lean and everything will function better to keep you healthy.

MAN IN THE MIRROR

I know by now you have all seen MJ`S accident with his hair on fire.......it brought tears to my eyes because the reason why he was burnt so badly was because he was wearing a jheri-curl, the hot hairstyle of the 80`s for black people.
I hated it then, I hate it now and if he didn`t have all that goo in his hair it might not have been so bad...look at the picture when he gets up with his scalp totally bald, it was just as if his hair had disintegrated which it did.
This style had so much grease ,I can`t even call it oil, that if you sat down in someones car you would leave a major oil spot on their head rest.
You would see the track marks sorry head marks of where a jheri curl wearing person had been.
It was a sad look...and if the weather changed and it threatened rain, your hair rained ....it dripped until the weather dried out- sad, sad, sad but black people loved it as it gave us the curls we always wanted and it lightened our thick coarse hair.
To see this man spinning to save his life and nothing came of it but a pain killer addiction, is mindboggling to say the least!
In 1984 I was 32 years old and a top hairdresser - that word doesn`t exist these days everyone is a stylist - anyway when the accident happened I knew right away that it ended up badly BECAUSE he was wearing a jheri curl......it has two potent chemicals,one to straighten it and then another to curl it.....put that with all the goo to keep it moist and curly......and there you have it, a recipe for disaster!
Just as how Michael`s father told him he was ugly because his nose was big, black people were all brainwashed to think our hair was the ugliest thing, how often I have had to correct people when they say I have 'good hair' because my hair has a natural, softer curl instead of a tight, kinky curl. Michael asked us to see the 'man in the mirror' we all had such low esteem that since it was so hard to keep our hair straight we thought greasy curls made us look better..........
Michael you need to know that in 2009 I`m wearing a huge afro, as it was called back in the day -it's called a natural now - and black people are running behind me to touch it and every where I go they tell me how fabulous my hair is.....God bless us!

SATURATED FATS

They recently showed on GMA how much saturated fat can affect your arteries in record time.....it was amazing to watch the results of the blood tests on the 2 reporters before and after eating a high fat meal....scary actually ....no wonder we are getting sicker and sicker.
We all need fat in our diets but we can eat foods like avocados, almonds or walnuts all high in fat but highly nutritious.Or we can add the right amount of olive oil to what we are eating which is very healthy , but no, we love bacon, fried chicken and the mac and cheese which is so high in saturated fat and overworks our heart.The GMA feature showed that our blood goes back to normal after a few hours or a few days depending on what we eat ,how much we eat and how long we have been eating it, as we keep eating like this day after day our blood gets thicker and thicker and harder to be pumped throughout our body therefore giving our heart, liver, kidneys etc. too much work to clean them and keep us healthy.
The doctor doing the tests was distressed and depressed as he remarked "this is how we are killing America" yes sir, not only America - these things have been shipped to 3rd world countries in massive amts. and we are also doing it to ourselves in the name of progress, like the new "made in Jamaica" vegetarian foods that have just come out.....the ingredient list almost takes up the entire bag and if you can pronounce one word you good!
Watching the reporters put their lives on the line to let us see, since we won`t hear,it came to me that it's just like how I keep preaching and I wonder if anyone is hearing....... so here I go one more time:
- Choose foods as close to, or in their natural state.
- Eat as little as possible the foods that come in boxes, jars and cans, that way we avoid preservatives.
- Eat foods with ingredients you can pronounce and look for the one word ingredient e.g.the ingredient of spinach is spinach....... choose the food with the short ingredient list, the longer the list the more additives and processing.
- Avoid anything thing with too long a shelf life
Also most important - remember the word is still moderation.

ANOTHER TAKE ON CANCER CARE COST

Funny, right after I blogged about the cost of cancer care and whether spending all that money makes sense , here comes the following article in last Sunday's Gleaner on the very same topic:

Not only is cancer deadly, but it can also be financially debilitating, costing as much as $100,000 per month for hospice or palliative care.
To afford care, the patient either needs to be rich, or insured.
"The cost of health care is becoming more and more forbidding and it is, therefore, extremely helpful to get insurance," says Sister Mary Andrews, administrator of the Consie Walters Hospice in Kingston where cancer patients get palliative care in the end stages of the disease.
"Two million dollars can disappear very quickly," she said.
Cancer is acknowledged as one of the biggest killers in Jamaica, but the Cancer Registry data end at 1999, when there were 2,697 deaths, and an assessed cancer prevalence of 140.5 per 100,000 population.
Early detection can reduce costs a great deal, says Sister Mary, although in some cases the disease recurs with further need for treatment.
But the cancer might be discovered in stage three or four, which is the end stage. At this point, lifespan would be shorter than a person with early detection, and costs would differ phenomenally.
"If you have years of treatment, then you can anticipate a health bill which is exorbitant. With hospice care, it's helpful to have insurance," Sister Mary said.
"Hospice care can use up a lot of your resources, especially for pensioners. One needs to prepare."
For a "subsidised" price of $2,000 daily, patients of Consie Walters get 24-hour nursing care, accommodation, meals, and laundry service.
Medication is an additional $45,000 monthly, depending on the types of medication needed, and whether the patient has National Health Fund (NHF) registration.
With the NHF card, medication can be as cheap as $40 per drug monthly; without NHF, it can be $3,500 for monthly supply of one drug.

I remember clearly my own experience of signing a cheque for J$330,000 and saying to myself "this for me to burn up my insides, what's wrong with this picture?"
I fully understand the story of the famous British conductor and his wife - Conductor Downes, wife die in Swiss suicide clinic . Oh to live in a country where you have a choice.....this could never happen in Jamaica as we are highly religious and believe if you take your own life you are going straight to hell!
My take on the whole matter is - yes , we are all going to die but why die DRUG FILLED AND TOXIC! NOT TO MENTION BROKE! As the old time saying goes - PREVENTION BETTER THAN CURE!

CANCER/PRESCRIPTION DRUGS ?

The exorbitant cost of cancer drugs makes me wonder.....is it really worth it? The choice really boils down to quantity or quality of life. A recent article in the WSJ looks at questions being asked about the Cost-Effectiveness of Cancer Drugs for example after paying US$80,000 per treatment people are asking themselves if it's worth being in debt but still having to walk with a walker and still be in horrific pain.
Most of us don`t think our treatments through, we just succumb to pressure and go along with the fear and scare tactics.....a few like Farrah Fawcett - march to their own beat but without the full picture, so they are fighting but not reaching anywhere.....We hear Ryan O`Neal saying that every time they got rid of 2 tumours from her liver 2 more would pop up - no surprise because she was doing nothing to make her new cells grow back healthy.... remember the coke-a-cola can by the side of her bed?
We bankrupt ourselves, go through tremendous pain, break down our minds and bodies because we just don`t know what to do.
I am listening to them talk abut the Oxycontin that MJ was taking, it seems as if prescription drugs are making us all crazy,just like how they have found out that all these uneccessary tests these doctors are telling us we need,we don`t need ,its the same way we are taking drugs we don`t need,but soon can`t live without.
It just came on the news that MJ would take 10-40 Xanax a night (hearsay,not a fact) it couldn`t be the Xanax we all hear about, if it is, it's a wonder he lasted so long.... remembering my friend who just died.... she was given Oxycontin which she took 4-6 times daily and was told she should take it whenever she needed. When she got them she said she asked the doctor "aren`t these narcotics, should I be taking so much of them?" - his answer was.."IT WON`T MATTER".....Lawd!
Bedside manners very necessary here !!.....but aside from that being a little too blunt, I just think doctors have gone crazy with prescribing...too many of them playing Dr. Feelgood.
We need to stop going for the quick fix and realize that we need to treat ourselves better not by spending big money, but by eating good food and having correct information... that is what helps us have a longer, healthier life.