5 Big No-Nos about Fruit-Consuming

We all know that there are many fruits that can fulfill our needs for vitamin. For example, fruits containing many vitamin C are kiwi, apple, orange, mango, cherry, strawberry, and so on. Fruits are also known as the source of antioxidants, such as tomatoes which contain lots of lycopene or mangoes which are rich in carotene. Therefore, fruits are essential in healthy living.

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It's true, but some people are overconfident in some merits of fruit. Truth is, there are couple of things that one have to understand about consuming fruits. Here are the 5 restrictions about fruit-consuming:

1. Consume Fruit as Substitute for Vegetables
Fruits contain some organic acid and aromatic substance which can increase the appetite. Despite the fact, veggies contain more mineral substances than fruits. If you only consume fruits, thinking that it's enough to substitute the veggies, your daily nutritional need are not filled. You still need to consume about 500 grams of veggies everyday.

2. Consume Fruit as Substitute for Meals
A human body can survive with at least 50 kinds of nutrition, especially more than 65 grams of (good) fat that can maintain regeneration and organ recovery. Fruits contain more than 85% of water but less than 1% of protein. Therefore, it can't fulfill the daily need for amino and fatty acid. It's better if you don't consume fruit as substitute for your meal. You can, however, consume it as a snack. See this post for a healthy meal plan.

3. Consume too Much Fruits in Order to Lose Some Weight
Basically, fruits can't be considered as low-calorie foods. More than 80% of fruit contains fructose, kind of "fruit sugar" if I may say so. Even if fruits contain less calories than rice, people always consume more fruit than rice because it taste great and succulent. Therefore, if this happens, more calories will be consumed and  your dietary goals won't be achieved.

4. Blinded by Imported Fruits
Some people actually think that imported fruits contain better and more nutrition. This is not always true, because some fruit lose its freshness from long transport time.

5. Relying on Fruits as Sources for Vitamin
Some fruit don't contain as many vitamins as we thought it would be. But if you want to fulfill your needs for vitamin, it's not wise to just rely it on fruits. You also have to consume it from other kinds of food. You can also fulfill it by consuming multivitamin and multimineral supplements.

Yes, fruits are highly nutritional foods and are good to consume daily. However, it is also important to pay attention on how you consume it. Consume it wisely!

12 Easy Steps to Lose Some Weight (Part 2)

Before reading this post, you'd better be finished reading the previous post. It's important to read it first, because you need to read it in order.

6. Choose a balanced menu. Never disregard one kind of nutrition. Fat is important too, but consume healthy fats such as fat from beans, fish, avocado, olive oil, or canola oil. Use supplements such as Omega 3 supplements to help you fulfill your healthy fat requirement. Besides its role in dissolving vitamins, fat are needed to balance your the hormones in your body.

7. Eat enough protein. Some of the sources of protein are chicken, fish, beef, tofu, tempe, egg (the whites), and beans. If you want to lose weight, and workout regularly, you have to consume large sum of protein.

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8. Some people still don't understand what carbohydrate is. Carbohydrate is the main energy source for our body, which also used as spontaneous energy in our body. To lose some weight, we have to know that while our body still use carbohydrate as its energy source, then the energy from fat only serves as energy reserves. Energy reserves won't be used as long as the main energy sources is still there. Therefore, lessening carbohydrate consumption usually works in weight loss.

NEVER substitute rice with noodles, because they're the same thing (noodles are carbohydrates too.....). What you need to know is it's important to have some carbohydrates after a workout. Not only it's important, but you HAVE to consume it immediately. You can also consume it after morning workouts, but choose only good carbohydrates.

9. Know your carbohydrates. Good carbohydrates are those that are slowly-absorbed, commonly known from its glycemic index (GI). You can click here for list of carbohydrate GI. If your carbohydrate is not on the list, you can also search it here. For a good diet, eat carbohydrate with less than 55 GI. If it's higher than that, eat it after a workout. However, a really high GI foods (such as sugar) should not be eaten while you're on a diet. In cooking, use other sweeteners other than sugar.

10. Consume enough fiber. It's better if you eat apple in its fruit form rather than blending it into apple juice. The blending process destroys the fibers in apples. Eat enough veggies too. Fibers are important for your digestive system, and also helps slowing down the calorie-absorption.

11. Drink enough water. Drinking 2,5 liters of water daily is compulsory.

12. When buying foods or biscuits, take a look at its Nutrition Facts. You don't want to destroy you diet, right? You have to look at the label of the food you're buying. Don't consume high fructose corn syrup because it has a really high GI. Make sure there's no hydrogenated vegetable oil too. Hydrogenated is a process of solidifying oil, and this will destroy your metabolism. For example, margarine and butter. Avoid these as much as possible.

After reading the 12 steps, analyze your activities and foods. Have you done any of those things?

There are some people that already know how to lose some weight, yet still underestimates them. For example, drinking 2,5 liters of water everyday. Many still don't understand why they have to drink that much, or they think they drink enough, when they still need lots.

My point is, you have to stick to those steps. It's the simplest summary to help you lose weight. If you still can't lose some weight, check the steps again, make sure nothing is missed.

I hope it helps :)

12 Easy Steps to Lose Some Weight (Part 1)

Here's a post that you have to read carefully, because it will answer the questions that people ask relentlessly: what do I have to do to lose weight? What kind of sport do I have to do? What kind of diet that I should do? I've done my diet, but why do I get ulcers instead of losing some weight?

That was just some of the questions that I get from the people around me, or in some social medias where people complain about their weight or imperfect body parts. So here I'm going to give you the steps on what you have to do to lose some weight.

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1. Take notes on your body's initial status. Measure your waist, thighs, arms, and chest. Weigh your weight, and find out the fat percentage in your body. This sounds silly, but it's actually important to keep track of your progress, and to evaluate the mistakes.

2. Make a realistic goal in your first month, such as losing 2 to 3 kg. Don't expect to lose 10 to 15 kg in your first month of dieting. The more realistic your goal is, the more motivated you are when you achieve and reaching the next goals.

3. Start working out. Whatever the sport is, it's better than just sleeping at home. For those who really want to lose weight, start investing your time to achieve your goal. When you want to lose weigh, don't EVER say that you don't have the time to workout. It's like saying you want to buy a car, but you don't want to work to get it. You have to fight for it! How you manage your time is up to you, because different people have different priorities in their life.

What is the sport to lose some weight? Any sport will do! But if you really want to lose some weight, it's best to lift weights, and end your workout with cardio in a treadmill. I will post some more about this later. Whatever sport you want to do, DO IT SERIOUSLY. Don't just join a gym to sit around, playing with your phone, and lift some weight occasionally. Work your body out, and mean it!

4. Review your menu. This is the most important part. How many times do you eat in a day? Many people think it's best to eat less when they should've consume less calories. For example, when you usually eat 2500 calories a day, lessen it into 2000 calories. It's better than lessening it into 1000 calories. Calorie deficiency will make your body turn into "survival mode", and won't burn your fat.

How many calories you have to consume can be calculated using the BMR calculator. Our body lower its metabolism when we're trying to eat less than a day (i.e. from 3 times a day into twice a day). We'll get hungry at first, but after 1 or 2 weeks, we'll get used to it, and won't get hungry even if we only eat twice a day. Hunger disappearance is a sign that our body burns less calories. The longer we're getting used to it, our body will adapt, and it will be harder to lose some weight.

5. Eat 5 or 6 times a day. Normally people eat 3 times a day, when in fact, our body was designed to eat more than that. When we have breakfast at 7 AM and eat lunch at 1 PM, we'll get hungry at 10 AM. When you have lunch at 1 PM and eat dinner at 7 PM, at about 4 PM we'll get hungry. This "hunger" usually be filled with junk foods (high-calorie foods, but not very filling because they contain minimum nutrition, thus making us fat).

Fill these in-between meals with high-nutrition snacks, such as apples and skimmed milk, or almonds and apples. In total, you'd eat 6 times, with 3 meals and 3 snacks. This is a sure way to stabilize your metabolism and will surely burn your fat faster. When you want to lower your calorie consumption from 2500 into 2000, divide the 2000 calories into 6 meals. Once again, to lose some weight, you lessen the calories, not the eating frequency. You can see the meal plan here, for an example of eating 6 times a day.

Yummy and Healthy Beverages

To achieve your ideal own ideal weight, it's really important to have some variations in your diet menu. Drink variations in your diet menu are as important as food variations. There are a lot of drink nowadays that are high in sugar, also artificial coloring and sweetener. Our body won't be in its best condition by consuming those drinks. So here I'm gonna post some of the healthy drinks that you can add into your diet menu :)

image credit to howtojuice.org

Orange Juice
The favorite drink that people usually add into their diet menu is orange juice. Orange juice got this natural flavor that people tend to like, and it's easy to prepare too. Besides its high content of healthy vitamin C and phyto-nutrition, eight ounce of orange juice had the same potassium content as it is in bananas. With its many vitamins and nutrition in it, orange juice has been believed to lower the blood pressure.

Apple Juice
Apple juice is a compulsory drink that you have to have in your diet menu. The right way to serve it is without sugar, because apples have enough sugar content to get the natural sweet taste. Fresh apple juice contains many useful vitamins and minerals. The malic acid in apples can be your additional energy when working out. The old saying of "an apple a day can keep the doctor away" is true, apparently, because there are already some research that indicates how apples can prevent heart diseases and lower the cholesterol.

Cranberry Juice
Another healthy drink is cranberry juice. The antioxidants from cranberry juice has been long known for its curing ability for urinary tract infections. The acidic taste from cranberry juice can prevent the growth of the germs causing the infections. A cranberry juice in your diet menu can keep you fit everyday.

Besides the three drinks, you can also combine it with other kinds of fruits and vegetables such as pineapples, carrots, and also tomatoes. With the three choices, you can be closer into the workout goal that you want to achieve :)