Healing Spices – by Dr. Bharat Aggarwal & Debora Yost

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This is exactly what the subtitle promises it to be, and more. It’s actually herbs and spices, but definitely mostly spices, and includes the kinds found in even the smallest supermarket, to some you might not have heard of, and might need to order online.

We are treated to an explanation of the health-giving properties of each (and any potential contraindications), as well as the culinary properties, many tables of what goes with what and how and why, and even recipes to use them in. For the more adventurous, there’s even advice on how to grow, prepare, and store each of them.

An extra benefit is that everything is cross-linked such that you can look things up by spice or by health condition or by flavor profile, and find what you need and what’ll go with it.

The style is simple and informational, clearly laid-out in encyclopedic form.

Bottom line: this book should be in your kitchen (or related nearby kitchen-book-place).

Click here to check out Healing Spices, and advance your culinary repertoire!

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  • Counterclockwise – by Dr. Ellen Langer
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    Pilates made simple! Dive into 40 exercises, convenient home routines, and easy-to-follow illustrations for improved mobility and strength with Pajama Pilates.

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  • Turkish Saffron Salad

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    Summer is upon us, and we need salad options. Coleslaw’s all well and good, until you’re the 4th person to bring it to the pot luck. Tzatziki’s great—and healthier than a standard coleslaw, being based in yogurt rather than mayonnaise as most Western coleslaws are (Eastern European coleslaws, for example, more often use a vinaigrette), but today our tastebuds are traveling to Turkey for this gut-healthy, phytochemical-rich, delicious dish.

    You will need

    • 12 oz carrots, cut into very thin batons (alternatively: use a peeler to peel it into super-thin strips)
    • 2 oz chopped nuts (pistachios are traditional, almonds are also used sometimes; many other nuts would work too e.g. walnuts, hazelnuts, etc; not peanuts though)
    • 2 cups kefir yogurt (if unavailable, substitute any 2 cups plain unsweetened yogurt; comparable plant yogurt is fine if you’re vegan; those healthy bacteria love plant yogurts as much as animal ones)
    • 1 bulb garlic, grated
    • 1 tsp chili flakes
    • 1 pinch saffron, ground, then soaked in 1 tbsp warm water for a few hours
    • 2 tbsp olive oil for cooking; ideally Extra Virgin, but at least Virgin

    Method

    (we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)

    1) Put the olive oil and carrots into a saucepan and heat gently, stirring. You want to soften the carrots just a little and absorb the olive oil, without actually fully cooking the carrots; this will probably only take 2–3 minutes at most. Take it off the heat and transfer it to a bowl to cool.

    When the mixture has cooled…

    2) Add the kefir yogurt, garlic, chili flakes, and saffron water into the carrots, mixing thoroughly.

    3) Add the chopped nuts as a garnish

    (after mixing thoroughly, you will probably see more of the yogurt mixture and less of the carrots; that’s fine and correct))

    Enjoy!

    Want to learn more?

    For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

    Take care!

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  • 7 Signs of Undiagnosed Autism in Adults

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    When it comes to adults and autism, there are two kinds of person in the popular view: those who resemble the Rain Man, and those who are making it up. But, it’s not so, as Paul Micallef explains:

    The signs

    We’ll not keep them a mystery; they are:

    1. Social interaction difficulties: such a person may struggle with understanding social cues, leading to awkwardness, isolation, or appearing eccentric.
    2. Need for structure and routine: either highly structured or disorganized, both of which stem from executive function challenges. The former, of course, is a coping mechanism, while the latter is the absence of same.
    3. Sensory sensitivities: can include sensitivities or insensitivities to light, sound, temperature, smells, tastes, and so forth.
    4. Spiky skillset: extreme strengths in certain areas, coupled with significant difficulties in others, leading to uneven abilities. May be able to dismantle and rebuild a PC, while not knowing how to arrange an Über.
    5. Emotional regulation issues: experiences of meltdowns, shutdowns, or withdrawal as coping mechanisms when overwhelmed. Not that this is “or”, not necessarily “and”. The latter goes especially unnoticed as an emotional regulation issue, because for everyone else, it’s something that’s not there to see.
    6. Unusual associations: making mental connections or associations that seem random or uncommon compared to others. The mind went to 17 places quickly and while everyone else got from idea A to idea B, this person is already at idea Q.
    7. Being “just different”: a general sense of being the odd one out, standing out in subtle or distinct ways. This is rather a catch-all, but if there’s someone who fits this, there’s a good chance, the other things apply too.

    For more on all of these, whether pertaining to yourself or a loved one (or both!), enjoy:

    Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

    Want to learn more?

    You might also like to read:

    Take care!

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  • 10 Simple Japanese Habits For Healthier & Longer Life

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    You don’t have to be Japanese or live in Okinawa to enjoy the benefits of healthy longevity. A lot of it comes down to simple habits:

    Easy to implement

    We’ll not keep the 10 habits a mystery; they are:

    1. Start the day with hot water: drinking hot water in the morning helps with hydration, warming the body, and aiding digestion.
    2. Enjoy a hearty breakfast: Japanese breakfasts are traditionally filling, nutritious, and help promote energy and longevity. Typical components include rice, miso soup, fish, and pickles.
    3. Take balanced meals: Japanese education emphasizes nutrition from a young age, promoting balanced meals with proteins, fiber, and vitamins & minerals.
    4. Enjoy fermented foods: fermented foods, such as nattō and soy-based condiments, support digestion, heart health, and the immune system.
    5. Drink green tea and matcha: both are rich in health benefits; preparing matcha mindfully adds a peaceful ritual to daily life too.
    6. Keep the “80% full” rule: “hara hachi bu” encourages eating until 80% full, which can improve longevity and, of course, prevent overeating.
    7. Use multiple small dishes: small servings and a variety of dishes help prevent overeating and ensure a diverse intake of nutrients.
    8. Gratitude before and after meals: saying “itadakimasu” and “gochisousama” promotes mindful eating, and afterwards, good digestion. Speaking Japanese is of course not the key factor here, but rather, do give yourself a moment of reflection before and after meals.
    9. Use vinegar in cooking: vinegar, often used in sushi rice and sauces like ponzu, adds flavor and offers health benefits, mostly pertaining to blood sugar balance.
    10. Eat slowly: Eating at a slower pace will improve digestion, and can enhance satiety and prevent accidentally overeating.

    For more on all of these, enjoy:

    Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!

    Want to learn more?

    You might also like to read:

    How To Get More Out Of What’s On Your Plate

    Take care!

    Share This Post

Related Posts

  • Counterclockwise – by Dr. Ellen Langer
  • Inheritance – by Dr. Sharon Moalem

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    We know genes make a big difference to a lot about us, but how much? And, the genes we have, we’re stuck with, right?

    Dr. Sharon Moalem shines a bright light into some of the often-shadowier nooks and crannies of our genetics, covering such topics as:

    • How much can (and can’t) be predicted from our parents’ genes—even when it comes to genetic traits that both parents have, and Gregor Mendel himself would (incorrectly) think obvious
    • How even something so seemingly simple and clear as genetic sex, very definitely isn’t
    • How traumatic life events can cause epigenetic changes that will scar us for generations to come
    • How we can use our genetic information to look after our health much better
    • How our life choices can work with, or overcome, the hand we got dealt in terms of genes

    The style of the book is conversational, down to how there’s a lot of “I” and “you” in here, and the casual style belies the heavy, sharp, up-to-date science contained within.

    Bottom line: if you’d like insight into the weird and wonderful nuances of genetics as found in this real, messy, perfectly chaotic world, this book is an excellent choice.

    Click here to check out Inheritance, and learn more about yours!

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  • Anti-Aging Risotto With Mushrooms, White Beans, & Kale

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    This risotto is made with millet, which as well as being gluten-free, is high in resistant starch that’s great for both our gut and our blood sugars. Add the longevity-inducing ergothioneine in the shiitake and portobello mushrooms, as well as the well-balanced mix of macro- and micronutrients, polyphenols such as lutein (important against neurodegeneration) not to mention more beneficial phytochemicals in the seasonings, and we have a very anti-aging dish!

    You will need

    • 3 cups low-sodium vegetable stock
    • 3 cups chopped fresh kale, stems removed (put the removed stems in the freezer with the vegetable offcuts you keep for making low-sodium vegetable stock)
    • 2 cups thinly sliced baby portobello mushrooms
    • 1 cup thinly sliced shiitake mushroom caps
    • 1 cup millet, as yet uncooked
    • 1 can white beans, drained and rinsed (or 1 cup white beans, cooked, drained, and rinsed)
    • ½ cup finely chopped red onion
    • ½ bulb garlic, finely chopped
    • ¼ cup nutritional yeast
    • 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
    • 2 tsp ground black pepper
    • 1 tsp white miso paste
    • ½ tsp MSG or 1 tsp low-sodium salt
    • Extra virgin olive oil

    Method

    (we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)

    1) Heat a little oil in a sauté or other pan suitable for both frying and volume-cooking. Fry the onion for about 5 minutes until soft, and then add the garlic, and cook for a further 1 minute, and then turn the heat down low.

    2) Add about ¼ cup of the vegetable stock, and stir in the miso paste and MSG/salt.

    3) Add the millet, followed by the rest of the vegetable stock. Cover and allow to simmer for 30 minutes, until all the liquid is absorbed and the millet is tender.

    4) Meanwhile, heat a little oil to a medium heat in a skillet, and cook the mushrooms (both kinds), until lightly browned and softened, which should only take a few minutes. Add the vinegar and gently toss to coat the mushrooms, before setting side.

    5) Remove the millet from the heat when it is done, and gently stir in the mushrooms, nutritional yeast, white beans, and kale. Cover, and let stand for 10 minutes (this will be sufficient to steam the kale in situ).

    6) Uncover and fluff the risotto with a fork, sprinkling in the black pepper as you do so.

    7) Serve. For a bonus for your tastebuds and blood sugars, drizzle with aged balsamic vinegar.

    Enjoy!

    Want to learn more?

    For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

    Take care!

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  • Escape From The Clutches Of Shame

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    We’ve written before about managing various emotions, including “negative” ones. We put that in “scare quotes” because they also all have positive aspects, that are just generally overshadowed by the fact that the emotions themselves are not pleasant. But for example…

    We evolved our emotions, including the “negative” ones, for our own benefit as a species:

    • Stress keeps us safe by making sure we take important situations seriously
    • Anger keeps us safe by protecting us from threats
    • Disgust keeps us safe by helping us to avoid things that might cause disease
    • Anxiety keeps us safe by ensuring we don’t get complacent
    • Guilt keeps us safe by ensuring we can function as a community
    • Sadness keeps us safe by ensuring we value things that are important to us, and learn to become averse to losing them
    • …and so on

    You can read more about how to turn these off (or rather, at least pause them) when they’re misfiring and/or just plain not convenient, here:

    The Off-Button For Your Brain

    While it’s generally considered good to process feelings instead of putting them aside, the fact is that sometimes we have to hold it together while we do something, such that we can later have an emotional breakdown at a convenient time and place, instead of the supermarket or bank or office or airport or while entertaining houseguests or… etc.

    Today, though, we’re not putting things aside, for the most part (though we will get to that too).

    We’ll be dealing with shame, which is closely linked to the guilt we mentioned in that list there.

    See also: Reconsidering the Differences Between Shame and Guilt

    Shame’s purpose

    Shame’s purpose is to help us (as a community) avoid anti-social behavior for which we might be shamed, and thus exiled from the in-group. It helps us all function better together, which is how we thrive as a species.

    Shame, therefore, is often assumed to be something we can (and possibly should) use to ensure that we (ourselves and/or others) “do the right thing”.

    But there’s a catch…

    Shame only works negatively

    You may be thinking “well duh, it’s a negative emotion”, but this isn’t about negativity in the subjective sense, but rather, positive vs negative motivation:

    • Positive motivation: motivation that encourages us to do a given thing
    • Negative motivation: motivation that encourages us to specifically not do a given thing

    Shame is only useful as a negative motivation, i.e., encouraging us to specifically not do a given thing.

    Examples:

    • You cannot (in any way that sticks, at least) shame somebody into doing more housework.
    • You can, however, shame somebody out of drinking and driving.

    This distinction matters a lot when it comes to how we are with our children, or with our employees (or those placed under us in a management structure), or with people who otherwise look to us as leaders.

    It also matters when it comes to how we are with ourselves.

    Here’s a paper about this, by the way, with assorted real-world examples:

    The negative side of motivation: the role of shame

    From those examples, we can see that attempts to shame someone (including oneself) into doing something positive will generally not only fail, they will actively backfire, and people (including oneself) will often perform worse than pre-shaming.

    Looking inwards: healthy vs unhealthy shame

    Alcoholics Anonymous and similar programs use a degree of pro-social shame to help members abstain from the the act being shamed.

    Rather than the unhelpful shame of exiling a person from a group for doing a shameful thing, however, they take an approach of laying out the shame for all to see, feeling the worst of it and moving past it, which many report as being quite freeing emotionally while still [negatively] motivational to not use the substance in question in the future (and similar for activity-based addictions/compulsions, such as gambling, for example).

    As such, if you are trying to avoid doing a thing, shame can be a useful motivator. So by all means, if it’s appropriate to your goals, tell your friends/family about how you are now quitting this or that (be it an addiction, or just something generally unhealthy that you’d like to strike off your regular consumption/activity list).

    You will still be tempted! But the knowledge of the shame you would feel as a result will help keep you from straying into that temptation.

    If you are trying to do a thing, however, (even something thought of in a negative frame, such as “lose weight”), then shame is not helpful and you will do best to set it aside.

    You can shame yourself out of drinking sodas (if that’s your plan), but you can’t shame yourself into eating healthy meals. And even if your plan is just shaming yourself out of eating unhealthy food… Without a clear active positive replacement to focus on instead, all you’ll do there is give yourself an eating disorder. You’ll eat nothing when people are looking, and then either a) also eat next to nothing in private or else b) binge in secret, and feel terrible about yourself, neither of which are any good for you whatsoever.

    Similarly, you can shame yourself out of bed, but you can’t shame yourself into the gym:

    Is there positive in the negative? Understanding the role of guilt and shame in physical activity self-regulation

    Let it go

    There are some cases, especially those where shame has a large crossover with guilt, that it serves no purpose whatsoever, and is best processed and then put aside.

    For example, if you did something that you are ashamed of many years ago, and/or feel guilty about something that you did many years ago, but this is not an ongoing thing for you (i.e., it was a one-off bad decision, or a bad habit that have now long since dropped), then feeling shame and/or guilt about that does not benefit you or anyone else.

    As to how to process it and put it aside, if your thing harmed someone else, you could see if there’s a way to try to make amends (even if without confessing ill, such as by acting anonymously to benefit the person/group you harmed).

    And then, forgive yourself. Regardless of whether you feel like you deserve it. Make the useful choice, that better benefits you, and by extension those around you.

    If you are religious, you may find that of help here too. We’re a health science publication not a theological one, but for example: Buddhism preaches compassion including for oneself. Judaism preaches atonement. Christianity, absolution. For Islam, mercy is one of the holiest ideals of the religion, along with forgiveness. So while religion isn’t everyone’s thing, for those for whom it is, it can be an asset in this regard.

    For a more worldly approach:

    To Err Is Human; To Forgive, Healthy (Here’s How To Do It) ← this goes for when the forgiveness in question is for yourself, too—and we do write about that there (and how)!

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

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