Cheese is one of the most favorite and popular foods which is a part of daily diet of overwhelming majority of modern families throughout the world. For the last decade, cheese consumption in the US increased by almost 22%. This dairy product is a very common ingredient of may dishes, the one which makes those dishes delicious. However, many people are trying to avoid eating lots of cheese as it is reported to have high content of saturated fat and cause cholesterol problems or other unwanted health conditions. At the same time, it is impossible to claim that moderate cheese consumption does not lead to any good for our health.

When talking about health benefits of cheese, it is necessary to mention the role this product plays for effective dental care and bone health. Rich with such elements as nutrients as calcium, phosphorus, zinc, vitamins B, cheese assists in bone formation and tooth enamel protection. Regular consumption of cheese in moderate doses can help to prevent such serious health problem as osteoporosis which affect a lot of modern women above 50. Other health benefits of cheese include reducing risk factors for hypertension and heart disease, strengthening liver, stimulating blood formation amd nutrient absorption, and others.

Recently, scientists found out that regular consumption of cheese and dairy products in moderate amounts can assist very effectively in weight management. A group of researchers leaded by Wendy Chan, a specialist at  Curtin University of Technology, Australia, found out that combining regular cheese consumption with low fat diet can increase the effectiveness of any weight loss program. After the experiments that lasted for several months, those participants who were consuming cheese on a regular basis experienced improvements in blood pressure and the unction of their cardio-vascular system.

These findings confirmed the results of researches of Michael Zemel, a nutritionist and medicine specialist in the University of Tennessee. His experiments took place in 2004, and Zemel also reported about positive effects of cheese consumption on weight reducing efforts. Zemel recommends consuming about 30 g of cheese on a daily basis, combining it with a balanced low fat diet. In addition to speeding weight loss, the nutritionist also point on other benefits of regular cheese consumption, which include normalizing blood pressure and reducing the amount of tummy fat. Finally, it can help improve metabolism and lower the risks of sleep disorders.

High levels of cholesterol is a problem of millions of modern people, and the following cholesterol lowering tips can help anyone to keep this problem under control.

1. Create a strategy for effective weight management. Studies showed that the higher BMI of a person, the more cholesterol is produced in the body. Approximately, every extra kilo you gain adds 2 more points to your cholesterol level. Try to follow a healthy nutrition plan, and your diet should be 70-75% of fruit, vegetables, cereal and grains, so only 25-30% of your diet can be meat and diary products.

2. Control your intake of fat. Fat with a high content of saturated fatty acids increases cholesterol level in our blood, and polyunsaturated fat consumption can cause certain cholesterol lowering. Therefore, it can be a good idea to limit consumption of saturated fat, containing in meat, cheeses, butter, etc. Instead, use fish products, low-fat milk, poultry and polyunsaturated oils, such as high quality sunflower oil or corn oil.

3. Limit your weekly intake of eggs. No need in avoiding eating eggs, just follow the rule “three eggs a week”. At that, remember that only yolk contains high amounts of cholesterol, therefore you can use egg-whites in larger amounts with no fear to suffer from high cholesterol.

4. Add beans to your daily diet. Beans contain pectin, which assists in cholesterol removal from the body.

5. Eat 2 medium size carrots on a daily basis. Carrots also have pectin, and according to a research, eating 2 carrots a day can help you in cholesterol lowering pretty much. Those people who follow this rule usually have 10-20% lower cholesterol levels than other people have. Also, regular consumption of carrots helps to prevent this common cholesterol problem.

6. Remember that garlic is one of the best herbal remedies for cholesterol lowering. This remedy can help you decrease the amount of saturated fat in your blood. However, there is a certain negative side effect of using garlic: just as it can lower you cholesterol levels, it can also lower the number of your friends. In anyway, consider taking liquid extract of garlic: taking just 1 g of such extract every day will help you to lower your cholesterol level for about 44 points within 6 months.

7. Use Plantain Seed Extract in addition to your diet. If you can not succeed in cholesterol lowering by using only a healthy nutrition plan, you can use another effective herbal remedy, Plantain Seed Extract.

8. Let active life-style be your way of living. Do lots of physical activities and exercises every single day. This is the best way to lower the levels of saturated fats in your blood, as well as helping your blood.

9. Give up smoking.  A group of scientists from Sweden carried out a series of experiment and found out that those people who smoke tend to have lower levels of polyunsaturated fat in their blood. At that, they claim that giving up this nasty habit help to raise the level of this useful fats quite fast.

10. Drink tea. Almost all sorts of tea contain great amount of tanin, which assist greatly in cholesterol lowering.

Eggplants, or aubergines, or Guinna Squashes, are dark purple shiny veggies, which have great nutritional value and are used for cooking really delicious meals. These relatives of peppers and tomatoes came to the Western countries from China, where they have been cultivated for thousands of years. Eggplants are very popular in the Middle East and used for cooking a great variety of meals, starting from amazing stews with hard cheese and ending with deserts. These purple veggies were introduced in Europe in the end of the 17th century, and very soon a famous scientist and botanist Thomas Jefferson started cultivating eggplants in the US.

Though nowadays eggplants are available throughout the year, their best season is late summer and autumn. 100 g of this vegetable has 27 calories. The most valuable element of eggplants is dietary fiber that forms soft spongy texture of the veggie. Eggplants can be a great source of B group vitamins, vitamins A and C, potassium, calcium, copper, iron, manganese, tryptophan, folate and other useful elements, which play a key role in providing us with the most important health benefits of eggplant.

High content of dietary fiber in these vegetables can assist in supporting our digestive system and fighting against heart disease. However, one of the main health benefits of eggplant is its property to lower bad cholesterol level in our blood. Many studies have proven this property of eggplant juice, but some experts are still not sure that the scientific evidence is enough. At the same time, all specialists agree that regular consumption of eggplant is linked to better brain activity. Due to high content of nasunin, a phytonutrient and a powerful antioxidant, eggplants can protect our brain cells from damage and help our body remove excessive amounts of iron.

The researches leaded by the specialists at American Diabetes Association showed excellent effects of eggplant for prevention and management of such a disease as type 2 diabetes, which can be achieved due to high content of fiber and substantial content of low soluble carbohydrates. Antioxidant and phenolic compounds can provide eggplant eaters with effective free-radical protection and lower chances to develop cancer. Finally, such properties as diuretic, antiviral and anti-bacterial effects should be also taken into account as important health benefits of eggplant.

If you do not have an allergy on this veggie, add it to your diet and enjoy the above mentioned therapeutic effects. There is a variety of ways of cooking eggplant, starting from boiling and ending with baking or grilling. As the skin of the vegetable is very useful and contains the most of antioxidants and polyphenols, choose only fresh eggplants that are free of scars, and cook them without peeling. Do not forget to keep the veggies in salty water for 20-30 minutes before cooking, this way you can get rid of natural bitter taste of the flesh. Finally, be careful with eggplants if you have problems with gall bladder or kidneys because these veggies contain oxalates which can crystallize in the body and cause serious health problems.

For the last decades, the popularity of oatmeal, or crushed oats, has been increasing on global level. More and more people around the world learn about numerous nutritional and health benefits of oatmeal, and start eating a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast on a daily basis. Before, oatmeal was commonly consumed in the form of porridge prepared after soaking the grains overnight in water and cooking on a low fire. In old Scottish and Irish cuisines oatmeal was also used as an ingredient for cookies and bakery, puddings and special oatcakes, as well as other traditional meals.

In our times, it is difficult to find a better and more useful breakfast idea than a bowl of oatmeal with low fat milk or with dried fruit and nuts. It is a very nutritious type of meal which will not make us feel hungry for quite long time. Oatmeal is a wonderful natural source of Vitamins B and E, a group of important minerals and very valuable dietary fiber, both soluble and insoluble. Specialists underline that it is exactly fiber that can provide us with, probably, the most important health benefits of oatmeal. Those include lowering the risks of having heat disease and suffering from other cardio-vascular diseases, improving our digestion and assisting in effective bowel cleaning, as well as protecting us against some types of cancer.

Another principal benefit of oatmeal is its property to lower blood cholesterol level and help in weight loss. It can be achieved due to a high content of betaglucan, a type of soluble dietary fiber. Consuming oatmeal on a regular basis can help us to provide our body with such important elements as iron, calcium, magnesium, thiamine and phosphorus, which are vital for normal development and function of our bones, muscles and teeth. Besides, oatmeal contains great amounts of one more important element zinc, which is essential for normal metabolism, normal reproduction and development of new tissues, as well as for glucose tolerance and nucleic acid stabilization.

Oatmeal is a universal and very useful meal for children and adult people, for babies and pregnant women. It is a perfect source of proteins. In addition, it is a sugar-free, low calories and low sodium meal which can be a great option for those who suffer from high blood pressure and for those who have some weight management problems. In order to enjoy the full variety of health benefits of oatmeal, be sure that you are buying not refined but whole grains. Certainly,  processed grains lose the majority of useful elements and nutrients during the production.

Constant feelings of being lonely, isolated and depressed may have really harmful effects on our psychological condition. In order to find a new remedy for feeling lonely and left out, the experts tried to base their therapeutic approaches on the idea that social isolation and depression make people feel cold. Two psychologists at the University of Toronto, Geoffrey Leonardelly and Chen-Bo Zhong, leaded a series of experiments directed on confirming or disconfirming this common assumption.

The first experiment involved 65 students who were split into 2 groups. The members of the first group were asked to recall the moments when they were left out of something and felt lonely. Other students were asked to tell about their memories of being involved in teamwork. Then, all the students were asked to estimate what was the temperature in the room. It turned out that those who were asked to remember their being lonely thought that actual temperature in the room is lower than it really was.

Another experiment included the same student playing a PC ball-toss game, at that some students were quite left out of the action, when the others were lively involved. After the game, all the participants were offered to choose a drink and a snack, like crackers, apples and a hot soup. The expected result was: those players, who were lacking attention and feeling left out were choosing hot tea, coffee or soup. More details about these experiments can be found in September 2008 issue of the journal Psychological Science.

The scientists are convinced that there are also reverse connections and it is possible to lower negative reactions linked to the feeling of loneliness and depression by using hot meals and drinks. “Our research suggests that warm chicken soup may be a literal coping mechanism for social isolation,” Leonardelly is convinced. If this is true, there is a way to develop a special “thermotherapy” and start using hot tea or soup as a remedy for feeling lonely and forgotten. Undoubtedly, such therapy would help thousands of people feel “warmer” and happier.

Autumn is a season when there is an abundance of various fruit and veggies. This is the perfect time to get charged with lots of useful elements and nutrients from natural sources, as well as enjoy rich and dense foods that could be prepared from fresh veggies. However, it is very important to pay attention on seasonal factors that impact our diet and eating patterns. In particular, in autumn everyone should keep in mind the following two tendencies that are connected with our nutrition and must be controlled through our seasonal diet.

First of all, when the weather gets colder, most of us prefer to warm ourselves with a cup of hot tea with cookies, chocolate or something sweet. Also, after long hot summer days, autumn is finally the time to eat richer, fattier and spicier foods, which are not always healthy. That is why for many people autumn is linked to receiving more pleasure from eating, accompanied with a slight weight gain.

Besides, there’s another problem which we all have to face to one or another extent. I am talking about autumn tiredness and depression. The experts are convinced that it is possible to lower the effects or completely avoid these negative seasonal factors by eating certain foods. In particular, adding to your seasonal diet the foods high with iodine (including sea kelp and seaweed, cheese, cow milk, yogurt, eggs, and others), which can stimulate metabolism and keep bright.

In addition, it is necessary to include to our daily diet the foods which can stimulate our body to produce serotonin, a hormone that has great influence on our mood. Rich and healthy natural foods, such as broccoli, beans, bananas and others should also be regularly consumed during this season. Finally, for good spirit and energy it is necessary to eat the foods with a high content of magnesium. Those include various nuts, dairy products, beans, bread and others.

One more important health benefit of green tea was recently discovered and now can be added to the list of numerous therapeutic properties of this amazing herbal remedy. One of the world’s most  reputable medical journals American Journal of Clinical Nutrition published the findings of a research by the specialists at the Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine,  Japan. The nutritionists found out that drinking 5 cups of high quality green tea on a daily basis is linked to better mental health and can assist in reducing the incidence of psychological distress by up to 20%.

More than 42,000 participants aged over 40 were involved in these experiments, at that 6.6% of them suffered from chronic psychological distresses. After several years of regular green tea consumption, everyone showed certain improvements of mental condition, especially those participants, who were under the effects of psychological distress the most. That is why it’s possible to speak about an inverse association between a regular consumption of green tea and being under effect of psychological distresses.

It is the second very important property of green tea directed on improving an individual’s mental health. Earlier, it was discovered that regular consumption of green tea or taking green tea extract has positive effects on those suffering from such mental problem as Alzheimer’s disease. Also, the experts underline that it is necessary not to neglect such problem as psychological distress. It is estimated that currently more than 450 million people in the world suffer from psychological distress to a great extent, and about 17% of those named stresses to be primary health risk factor.

Autumn is the time for my favorite flowers, chrysanthemum. White or pink, yellow or red, they all are extremely beautiful, tender and sensitive, just like old Italian romantic songs. In herbal medicine, Chrysanthemum indicum has been one of the principal herbs in traditional Chinese medicine since the ancient times. Chrysanthemum tea was quite a popular treatment in ancient China for a great number of inflammatory diseases, including stomatitis, influenza, tonsillitis, pneumonia, dermatosis, etc. Also, special tinctures and herbal mixtures with Chrysanthemum flowers were used for external purposes: in particular, as an effective skin treatment, as a remedy for fever reduction, and so on.

Chemical composition of this herbal remedy includes kikkanols, sesquiterpenes, flavonoids, various essential oils containing camphor, cineole, sabinol, borneole and other elements. Also, Chrysanthemum indicum can be a source of such chemical elements as sulfur, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium and others. In addition to very powerful anti-inflammatory properties, Chrysanthemum tea is considered to be an excellent herbal remedy due to its other therapeutic effects, namely antiviral, antimicrobial, antiasthma, antihyperkinesia and so on.

All aerial parts of the plant (leaves, stems and petals) can be used for preparing teas, tinctures or extracts. In addition to all above mentioned, Chrysanthemum indicum is helpful for such diseases as gout, atherosclerosis, varicose veins and other health conditions. Recently, a series of medical tests were carried out to check out the effectiveness of this herbal remedy as a treatment for arthritis pains (a study of the specialists at School of Pharmacy, Anhui Medical University, China). Besides, Chrysanthemum tea and extracts are valued for their high content of flavonoids, giving us the opportunity to enjoy anti-aging and anti-cancer benefits of this herbal remedy.

Nowadays, Chinese medical specialists tend to popularize this plant and revive wide usage of Chrysanthemum indicum in modern pharmacology. After a series of clinical studies and laboratory researches, it became clear that this plant can be a pioneer for a new generation of herbal remedies. Chemical content and elements of chrysanthemum have a potential to prevent cancer in a unique manner. It turned out that active elements of Chrysanthemum indicum can inhibit cancerous cells, and they are especially effective in combating liver cancer. It is also interesting that the chemical compounds have a property to block the processes only in cancerous cells and do not affect healthy cells.

In our times, scientists suggest a number of ways how to use natural approaches and certain herbal remedies to boost our memory. You can add to your diet such foods as walnuts, blueberries, spinach, broccoli, tomatoes or pumpkin seeds. Herbal remedies which can help us improve our memory include sage, rosemary, ginseng, Ginkgo Biloba or an exotic herb called “gotu kola“, which is quite popular in India. In the beginning of 2009, German scientists reported in the journal Science about one more effective way to use herbal remedies to boost memory. They claim that the scent of roses can have positive effects on our memory and help us memorize the things better.

During the experiments, which took place in Germany and were carried out by two groups of the scientists at the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf and the University of Lübeck, medical students had to perform some concentration and memorization exercises.  In particular, they tried to memorize the localization of certain cards on a computer screen. After that, some of the students were receiving rose scent through special masks. The scientists were sending the bursts of rose scent because it was found out that our brain has a property to adjust to smells very effectively and for a very short period of time.

The next day, the participants were supposed to remember the location of the cards. Repeated experiments proved that rose scent have positive effects on our memory: those students who received the rose scent could remember up to 97% cards, but those who did not receive could remember only about 86% of the cards. The scientists also tried to apply rose scent bursts during sleep, and it turned out that the effects are even better. Neuroscientists who monitored the sleep, also underlined that sleep quality increases substantially under effect of rose scent. That is why this scent is highly recommended for aromatherapy in all cases of sleep disturbances.

More and more of disappointing facts are found out about our favorite orange juice, which we used to consider one of the healthiest and the most useful fruit juices. Just recently the scientists warned us that drinking orange juice on a regular basis can seriously affect our dental health and damage our tooth enamel. More to that: according to the results of the latest research by the specialists from Harvard Medical School, regular intake of orange juice (even one glass a day) is inked to increased level of sugar in the blood and increased risk of having type 2 diabetes in women.

About 71,000 of American nurses participated in the long-term experiments. For 18 years their eating habits were supervised and recorded. As a result, it turned out that drinking a glass of orange juice regularly (every morning) increases the risks of having type 2 diabetes in women up to 18 percent, and drinking 3 glasses a day are connected with 24 percent increase. The specialists suppose that this phenomenon should be attributed to the damaging effects of natural sugars which can be found in orange juice. In the absence of fiber the we receive when we eat fruit, natural sugars get absorbed in our digestion system very fast and cause increased sugar level in our blood.

Therefore, if you like drinking a glass of juice (especially a glass of arguable quality commercial fruit juice from a supermarket) in the morning, you should think twice about possible health effects of this habit. Type 2 diabetes is one of the hardest health conditions which currently affects more that 2 million people in the Great Britain. The specialists recommend replacing drinking juice with eating fresh fruit as the fruit can provide you with the fiber necessary for slowing down sugar absorption. You can read more about the findings and comments on this interesting research in the latest issue of the journal Diabetes Care.