My dear friends,

Abby’s Choice will be moving !!

It is now located at http://abbyschoice.blogspot.com/ !

Thank you for your visit and all your support! I hope to see you at my new home! =)

Oh, and don’t forget: Abby’s YouTube channel is still at http://www.youtube.com/AbbyChoice .

Be well,

Abby

The Codfish Balls is another typical Portuguese recipe, very famous throughout the world, specially in England. It is very good as a starter or as a main dish, served with white rice. Make several pieces at a time, because they’ll disappear…

Ingredients:

1 codfish stake

2 potatoes

1 egg

garlick

1 bunch of parsley

olive oil

Preparation:

1 – Remove the skin and the fish bones from the cod stake.

2- Shred the cod into thin and short pieces.

3 – Boil the potatoes on a pan with water and a few drops of olive oil (no salt!).

4 – Once boiled, remove the water and smash the potatoes with a fork.

5 – Chop the garlick and the parsley into tiny pieces.

6 - Separate the eggyolk from the eggwhite and beat this last on until thick and sticky.

7 – In a deep dish, gather the cod, the potatoes, the garlick, the parsley, the eggyolk and the eggwhite and knead it all whith your (clean) hands.  Make little balls the size of your palms.

8 - Cover a frying pan with some olive oil. Put  the codfish balls over it and keep rolling them until they turn goldish.

You can serve them warm or cold. Goes well with white wine.

Enjoy!

For all of you who, like me, twice a year go through a series of events which I think, every single time, are going to lead me to madness, then this is a post for you. I mean all of you out there who are students and make those nasty things called E-X-A-M-S … and, also, to everyone who works with the Human Being’s most precious tool – our brain!

Here are a few advices on how to make your work more efficient, more productive, less tiring and more healthy!

1 ) ” To eat or not to eat, that is the question”

That is usually my top 5 dilemma. Should I eat a few of those delicious chocolate cookies because they will give me energy and I will study with more power and, by the way, did I mention they are DELICIOUS?!

Or should I not because I am going to be sitting-all-day-long-in-my-chair-and-my-butt-will-be-totally-sqaure-by-the-end-of-the-week?

The answer is – NOT the chocolate cookies; but DO eat, please!

Our brain’s only fuel is glucose – that is: pure sugar. If you are thinking “yummy, all right then!”, well I am sorry to say there is a downside. When you eat pure sugar, it will be very quickly absorbed to your brain, muscles and other tissues, which will make your blood’s sugar levels return to normal, which will make you crave for more sugar, and so on. Those “other tissues” include fat tissue, which is very avid for sugar, and will store it in the form of fat, unlike the brain, who will use it.

The major problem is yet to come: when you eat whataver substance, your bodyreleases insulin, a hormone that will make you store anything you eat for the next three hours. You start getting the big picture, and I believe those chocolate cookies don’t seem so fine anymore.

What is the solution, then?

Simple: have complex sugar – starch! “Oh my God starch will make me fat, that’s why all those diets have none!” – WRONG!

Starch will be metabolized into glucose (that pure sugar your brain needs), but slow and steady, so your glucose levels in your blood will be constant and, therefore, you won’t crave because you’ll feel satisfied, and your brain will have all the energy it needs!

2 ) Coffee or sleep?

I would recommend both, but never when you need them at the same time.

In your everyday-life, you should sleep about eight hours; when you study or work intensely, you should sleep some more. I would say 9 or 10 hours of sleep would make you wonders. Of course that when you don’t have much time, the tendency is to cut down on your sleep, and that is a big mistake!

Sleep will make you rest your brain and your body, and everything you learned during the day will be “deposited” in your memory. Plus, you will wake up fresher after a good night sleep and the next day will be very productive.

About coffee, I support it entirely! It helps to get you focused and it is good to wake you up in the  morning after those long hours of repairing sleep. Plus, it keeps your metabolism from slowing down, which usually tends to happen when you sit quietly for a few hours.

3 ) Keep that body moving

Exercise is fundamental for a healthy balance. After a long day of studying, a nice cardio workout followed by some light  weight lifting will clear your head, garantee you a good night sleep and pump up a few endorphins, which stimulate your brain’s activity. Plus, it will keep you fit!

4 ) Final touch

Your studying environment is a key element for your good results. You should choose the place where you work better – for some is their room, for others it’s the coffee shop close to home.

Wherever you study, you should pay attention to some guidelines:

-  the height your chair and your desk should match, so you don’t bend over or reatch out for your books;

- your feet should touch the ground so you don’t get backackes;

- the light should be bright, so you don’t have to squeeze your eyes to read, and it should come from a direction that won’t create a shadow of your hand while writing;

- it should be cozy – not too warm, not too cold;

-  there shouldn’t be any smoke around, and if you are a smoker, I challenge you to visit this website http://www.cancer.org/docroot/PED/ped_10_1.asp

5 ) After work

Keep some time to relax, have fun, get distracted from all the work. If you like to work out, it may be a good getaway.

For others, it might not be enough or not good at all. Here are some suggestions: go to the movies, watch TV, cook for friends/girlfriend/boyfriend, walk your dog, clean your room, play PC…

I wouldn’t advise you to read anything or to make anything that pushes your brain off your head, since it is already exhausted – give him a break too!

Also, I wouldn’t recommend to have any night caps or sleeping pills, since they will almost certainly affect your next day’s work. If you feel like you have troubles falling asleep, try to exercise a bit more next day and to cut all caffeine after 5 PM!

Have a good work and good luck for your exams!

We all make smaller or bigger mistakes, regarding our health. Some are well-known and we usually are aware of making them, but just don’t give it much importance at the time – either because it is not a habbit, or because we don’t have a better solution at the moment … or even because we are too lazy to be in a healthy-mood.

Those aren’t the real problem – the ones that you might not know of are!

So here are a few common mistakes that you may not know you are commiting – and how to avoid them, creating healthier habbits:

1) Having a snack before a meal

This is probably the most common one. Especially made by women – while cooking dinner, when the appetite starts pumping. So all day long she didn’t eat any of the delicious-looking chocolate donughts on the office’s bar showcase, she cut the sugar on her coffee and she even ate just an apple during the afternoon. So, she spared on calories, right? And a diet cracker won’t hurt, since she is about to eat… and besides, it’ll reduce her appetite before dinner, right?

WRONG…

All the day’s effort when toilet-flushed! By having that innocent-looking cracker, you just shoot a spike of insulin (an anabolic hormone – which means it makes your body absorb nutrients), which will last for about 1h30min, making all you eat get in right away!

So, if you really must eat something before a meal, than make sure you will only eat again in about 1h30 … if you know you won’t, then just wait a while… it will be worth it!

2)  Having a sweet for a snack

The rationale for this choice usually is: ” This is sweet, I know, but if I don’t eat anything else this afternoon, it kinda balances off…”.

WRONG…

The only time you should eat sweets is after a meal. That way your body won’t absorb most of it, because you already had what you needed to nourish yourself.

3) Having just a soup for lunch

Terrible!

Leave the only-soup-meal for dinner, because if not you will be starving 2 hours later and devour anything you can get a grip on!

This recipe was suggested to me by my Sweety, which makes me really proud to post it. Especially because it turned out to be DELICIOUS!! Breath-taking, actually, and we keept repeating the dose until there was none left.

And the best thing is: you can make it with all sorts of flavours!!!

Ingredients:

150 g (5,3 oz) flour

150 g (5,3 oz) butter

100 g (3,5 oz) sugar

1 pack strawberry-flavoured powder juice (we used Tang)

3 eggs

water

Preparation:

1- Turn on the oven at 180ºC (356º F)

2 - Mix the sugar with the eggs in a bowl and stir.

3 – Add the melted butter and stir again.

4 - Add the flour and stir some more.

5 - In another bowl, pour the juice powder and add some water, enough for the powder to disolve.

Tip: If you prefer a moist cake, you can divise the juice – 2/3 go in the dough and 1/3 will be used to sprinkle the cake aterwards.

6 - Mix the juice with the dough until obtaining a homogenous mixture. It should have a bubble-gum-like colour. And it smells really good.

7 – Taste the dough. Depending on the juice powder, you might need to add some more sugar. If so, add just 3 teaspoons at a time and taste again until perfect.

8 - Grease a mould, pour the dough and take it to the oven for about 30 min. As soon as the cake starts to get a bit golden, take it out.

9 – If you decided to separate the juice, once you unmold the cake, make some small holes with a toothpick, add some more water to the juice and srpinkle over the cake.

10 – Tcha-nuh!!

Tip: Gets along perfectly with vanilla icecream….

Here is the Printable .pdf .

For more information, see text.

Enjoy!

Here are some great exercises to do when you are in the swimming pool, either making laps or having fun. They take about 10 minutes and will keep you toned and firm.

These localized exercises work your lower body, abominal muscles and arms.

Try them out and make your swimming pool session a more complete one! Water is a great tool, since it makes resistance against your movements, acting as a giant whole-body-weight.

Each exercise comprises 2 series of 20 repetitions. You should feel a bit sore by the end of the session.

After some sessions, you may find out you don’t get sore anymore and that it gets easier. By then, increase to 3 series of 20 repetitions.

When that becomes easy, increse to 3 series of 25 repetitions.

Once you get to 3 series of 30 repetitions, try some different exercises, so you’ll use your muscles in a different way.

You can download a .pdf document with all of the exercises in the Printables section.

ONE

Place your legs over the pool border, as shown in the figure.

Extend your arms foward and raise your upper body slowly until your fingers touch your toes.

Alternatively and to make it more difficult, you can put your hands behind your head.

Retunr to the first position slowly and repeat.

TWO

Place your extended arms over the pool border, as shown in the figure.

Extend your legs backwards. Now, pretend you are swimming, moving your legs up and down alternately.

One repetition is complete when both leg went up and down.

Squeeze your bum and extend your toes for maximizing the muscle use.

THREE

Lower your legs, maintaining your arms extended over the pool border, shoulder-wide.

Extend your legs downwards, like you were standing.

Slowly raise your knees, by flexing your legs, until they reach your chest, between your arms. Extend your legs again, slowly, until reaching the previous position.

Try to keep your back straight to increase the abdominal muscles’ work.

Make it more complete: After these series, make the oblique series. Raise your legs to one side, until it reaches your elbow, then lower them. After completing one serie, make the same thing to the other side.

FOUR

Grab the pool border as most convenient with your hands.

Extend one of your legs and raise the other one laterally, the most you can. Lower your leg again and repeat, always slowly.

To make this exercise more difficult, instead of keeping the static leg extended, you can flex it and lean your knee on the pool wall.

After one serie, do the same with the other leg. Repeat both series.

More difficult still: Extend both legs and make circles, keeping them straight. Make one serie on the inward sense, then make one on the outward sense. Repeat.

FIVE

Place yourself on the same position as the previous exercise. It is better, however, to keep your knee bent, to support your lower back.

Extend your free leg backwards, squeezing your bum tight.

Repeat with other leg.

To have a good weight and figure, you don’t need to suffer.

To have “ideal” measures, you just have to be wise and smart.

To make a good start, take notice of these hints.

1) BioLogic

If you think about what human beings were made to be, you’ll find that we lead lives much different than we were supposed to.

The Human Being was made to

- run for hunting

- sleep once the sun sets

- starve through rough seasons

- seek food and shelter, walking for miles to find a safe place to create a family

The Modern Human Being

- drives a car, uses elevators and treadmills

- goes to sleep after 10 PM (sometimes you better call it before 6 AM)

- has a fridge and a supermarket

- live in the apartment just down the street

No wonder that, with all the technological evolution running faster than biological evolution, the human race hasn’t had enough time to adapt to the new circumstances: abundance.

You don’t need to go to the woods and hunt rabbits, wearing a cat fur and sleeping on the hard rock. Save the cat fur for a cocktail and woods/hunting/sleeping on hard rock for camping.

All you need to do is change a few habbits of your daily life.

a) Eat regularly. This means you will re-learn the feeling of hunger – that is, to differenciate it from glutony. To do this, start eating meals every 3 hours. Don’t eat before the 3 hours and after the 3 hours have passed, eat even if you are not hungry. After a week or so doing this, you will have acquired a healthy eating rythm.

b) Eat properly at every meal. Staring with breakfast – NEVER MISS YOUR BREAKFAST – it is the most important meal of the day and it will provide you energy throughout the morning. Have a nice balance between carbohydrates, proteins and vegetables at main meals. You should be feeling satisfied by the end of the main dish – if not, have one more serving of vegetables. Always have fruit for dessert. If you still want to have a sweet after that, go ahead – but just a little portion!

c) Have 3 main meals and 2 small meals. Breakfast, lunch and dinner will be the main meals – so they will be more complete and provide you more nutrients. The mid-morning and mid-afternoon small meals will keep your sugar level stable and give you some more energy to finish the half-day. If you can, dinner should be lighter than lunch.

d) Early to bed, early to rise. This may be one of the most important changes you make. You will feel more energetic after just 3 days and you will be more efficient at everything you do. Try to do the work in the morning instead – you’ll see how the day becomes longer!! A good trick is to sleep with the curtains open, so you wake up slowly as the sun rises. It will feel wonderful!

e) Exercise daily. It doesn’t mean you’d have to run the marathon everyday, but at least take a 30 min walk, take the stairs, walk to the supermarket or to work, walk your dog, you name it!!

f) Eat as few sweets as you can. If you really, really have to eat some, do it at the end of a main meal – this way, it will be less absorbed. If you one of those people (like me…) who have a sweet tooth, don’t cut sweets completely, or you’ll be in a bad mood. Try to reduce to the minimum – either only once a day, once a week, once a month (OH MY GOD…)…

g) Go natural. Processed foods are (evolutionnary speaking) something new. This includes, nowadays, most of the available foods. But there are quite a few choices that can be quite au naturel. Fruit, raw vegetables, fresh fish and meat and whole-grain fruits are good examples.

2) Moderation

A good rule to follow anytime. In Portugal we have a funny expression: “neither 8 nor 80″. To be too fat is bad for you, but to be too skinny also. To exercise too much can cause you damage, but not to exercise at all can have quite as nasty consequences.

So the diets that cut completely with one type of nutrient (carbohydrate, protein, vitamins…) cannot be healhty. Nor can those that make you spend one week only drinking juices and water. And I don’t have to talk about the eat-what-you-want-whenever phylisophy.

Also, working out for 3 hours a day will most certainly make you lose those extra pounds, but you will get them back in no time once you strain your knee. Ironically, you can also strain your knee from not using it…

So, bottom line: in middle lies the virtue.

Eat with moderation. Drink with moderation. Exercise with moderation. Sleep with moderation.

Have health in abundance =).

3) Go for the long-run

It’s harder to stick to a health program than to attain a goal.

It’s easy to think: “I need to fit these pants in 2 months” and to have that motivation in your head all of those 60 days. But then… “I am already thin, I an have this cake!” or “Gained some weight? No problem, I’ll lose it next week” or even worse “I’ll skip the next three meals to compensate for this fast-food”.

Oh no, you won’t. That’s what they call a Yo-Yo. You know what are the first things to appear on women when you do this? Skin striations. Those you can’t lose. Never ever. And the bad consequences go from bad to worse.

Not to mention the peace of mind you can get to have a stable health, a healthy weight, a healthy skin, a good and honest smile an zero fear of the scale.

That’s what you get from adopting that lifestyle indefinitely.

I remind you that it doesn’t mean you can’t make a little sin or two once in a while. You can and you should. I try to do it once a week – more commonly twice – generally on fridays. On the day you chose to skip the healthy living, really do it. That way, you’ll feel satisfied and it will be natural for you to keep sticking to healthy choices for the rest of the week – causa you had a bit of something you really wanted. No sacrifice, just choices!

4) Ask for help when you need

There are people whose job is, exactly, to improve your health, wether it is a physician, nurse, sports teacher, nutritionist or, simply, a friend.

If you feel like something is wrong with you, don’t be afraid to share. And please, do!

5) Don’t worry, be happy!

The most important thing is that you feel good about yourself. If you need to be more in shape to feel better, than do it. If you need to lower your cholesterol to reduce your cardiovascular risk, then go for it!

Any change in your lifestyle should be slow and progressive, or your body will resent you and won’t be able to keep up.

Be patient and make the choices that are the best for YOU. If you care about yourself, then it’s a pretty good start! If you are reading things on the web or on books, you are already taking some steps!

Keep up!!! Good luck!!!

Posted in Exercise, Nutrition, Tips and How to Tagged: Exercise and fitness, Healthy living, Nutrition ]]> http://abbyschoice.wordpress.com/2009/08/26/measure-can-rhyme-with-pleasure/feed/ 0 Abby prehistoric man timeline clock eatwell plate go natural moderation long run smile http://abbyschoice.wordpress.com/2009/08/24/fish-in-a-snap/ http://abbyschoice.wordpress.com/2009/08/24/fish-in-a-snap/#comments Mon, 24 Aug 2009 14:04:35 +0000 Abby http://abbyschoice.wordpress.com/?p=316 ]]>

Ingredients:

4 pieces of whitefish

1 pack cream

1 lemon

salt

herbs de provence

Preparation:

1 – Place the whitefish in a dish.

2 – Cover with the lemon’s juice and some salt.

3 – Spice it with herbs de provence and pour the cream over it.

4 – Take it to the oven at medium heat until slightly golden (about 15 min).