Chiropractic Weekly Health News:

A recent study sought to evaluate the effectiveness of music listening in reducing depressive symptoms.  Researchers systematically searched 9 databases and reviewed 17 studies.
They found that listening to music over a period of time helps to reduce depressive symptoms in the adult population. All types of music potentially worked, depending on the preferences of the listener.

According to the study, as reprinted on the website Green Med Info:

“There is a need to conduct more studies, which replicate the designs used in the existing studies that met the inclusion criteria, on the level of efficacy of music listening on the reduction of depressive symptoms for a more accurate meta-analysis of the findings and reflect with greater accuracy the significant effects that music has on the level of depressive symptoms.”

Sources:

Complementary Therapies in Medicine December 2011; 19(6): 332-348

  Green Med Info

Technorati Tags: music and depression

Method

1 Whisk cider, cornstarch, mustard, honey, salt and pepper (to taste) in a bowl. Set aside.

2 Salt the chicken well and dust in flour. Shake off the excess.

3 In a large non-stick skillet, heat the oil on medium to medium high heat. Once the oil is hot add the chicken breasts to the pan. Cook until golden brown on one side, about 3-4 minutes. Turn chicken, add apples, and cook until the chicken has browned on the other side.

4 Add chicken broth and cider mixture to the pan and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down to low, cover the pot and simmer until chicken is tender, about 15 minutes.

5 With slotted spoon, remove chicken and apples to serving plates. Spoon sauce over chicken and apples and sprinkle with parsley. Serve with rice or noodles.

Yield: Serves 4.

Close to 20 states or cities in the U.S. are considering the possibility of a tax on sugar-sweetened beverages.  Organizations that have called for reductions in sugar-sweetened beverage consumption include the World Health Organization, American Academy of Pediatrics, American Heart Association, Institute of Medicine and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The beverage industry, however, has been flexing its economic and political might in ways reminiscent of the tobacco industry during the 1950s. The arguments they are making are the same as the ones that were made on behalf of cigarettes decades ago — that the taxes are “discriminatory” in singling out one category of food, that taxes will not work, and that government should not tell people what to do.

According to Time Magazine:

“Similar to tobacco companies, the soda industry has created a front group, Americans Against Food Taxes, to run anti-tax campaigns  … The tobacco industry paid scientists who did research disputing links between smoking and lung cancer, the addictive nature of nicotine, and the dangers of second-hand smoke. The soda industry funds scientists who reliably produce research showing no link between [sugar-sweetened beverage] consumption and health … The beverage industry has been successful thus far in fighting off significant taxes through heavy lobbing, questionable tactics, and the attempt to appear public-health minded, but they, too, are likely to be embarrassed as light shines upon them.”

Sources:

Time Magazine October 24, 2011

This week’s recipe was found on: Simplyrecipes.com
Posted by Elise on Sep 26, 2011

Called papas bravas or patatas bravas in Spain, this dish is essentially potatoes cooked in a spicy sauce and served as an appetizer, or tapas. Variations abound in both the cooking method—the potatoes are fried, boiled or roasted—and the sauce, which usually has hot chiles, tomato and vinegar. The name of the recipe roughly translates into “fierce” or “angry” potatoes. But these potatoes are as spicy or “fierce” as you make them. We’ve made ours with some tomato sauce, quite a bit of Tabasco, and some smoked paprika. The potatoes absorb a lot of heat, so they’re not as hot as you would think, given the amount of hot sauce. You can easily reduce the heat to taste. The smoked paprika called for in the recipe really helps these potatoes shine, but sometimes it can be hard to find. McCormick makes smoked paprika, so you may be able to find it at your local supermarket. If not, just substitute regular paprika (sweet).

Spanish Roasted Potatoes with Tomato Sauce Recipe

This recipe makes more than enough sauce for the potatoes, so you can double the amount of potatoes for more servings, or save the extra sauce for later. It will keep a week in the refrigerator.

Method

1 Preheat oven to 375°F. Toss the potatoes with 3 tablespoons of olive oil and salt well. Arrange in one layer in a casserole pan or rimmed baking tray and roast until browned, about 50 minutes.

2 While the potatoes are roasting, make the sauce. Heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a medium pot set over medium-high heat. Sauté the chopped onions, stirring occasionally, for 4-5 minutes, or until they begin to brown on the edges. Add the garlic and sauté another 2 minutes.

3 Add the white wine to the pan and turn the heat to high. Boil on a high boil until the wine is reduced by half, then add the tomato paste and stir to combine. Add the crushed tomatoes, Tabasco sauce, salt, sugar and smoked paprika. Stir well and reduce the heat to a bare simmer. Let the sauce cook slowly while the potatoes roast. If you want, you can use a blender or an immersion blender to purée the sauce until smooth.

4 When the potatoes are well browned, toss with the tomato sauce and return to the casserole pan. Continue to roast until the tomato sauce dries out a bit on the potatoes and caramelizes, about 10 minutes.

Serve with the remaining tomato sauce as an appetizer or side dish.

Yield: Serves 4 as a side dish.

Technorati Tags: chiropractic health, recipes, Spanish potatoes

Photo credit: Randy Mayor; Styling: Leigh Ann Ross
Enliven a familiar side dish with exotic flavors. Curry powder, cumin, and cinnamon combine with a hint of heat from ground red pepper to make these Indian-inspired sweet potatoes stand out in a meal. Use leftovers to top a shepherd’s pie, or thin them out with milk and broth to make curried sweet potato soup that you can sprinkle with chopped cilantro. This highly seasoned dish pairs well with chicken, pork, and turkey.

Yield: 6 servings (serving size: about 2/3 cup)

Ingredients

6 1/2 cups (1-inch) cubed peeled sweet potato (about 2 pounds)
1 tablespoon butter
1/4 cup finely chopped shallots
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper
1/3 cup half-and-half
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Preparation

1. Place potato in a medium saucepan; cover with water. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer 15 minutes or until tender. Drain well; return to pan. Keep warm.
2. Melt butter in a small nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add shallots to pan; cook 6 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Stir in brown sugar, salt, curry powder, cumin, cinnamon, and red pepper; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Add shallot mixture, half-and-half, and lemon juice to potato. Mash potato mixture with a potato masher to desired consistency.

Maureen Callahan, Cooking Light
MARCH 2008

Technorati Tags: Chiropractic, chiropractor, sweet potato recipe

Our recipe of the week comes From Kalyns Kitchen A great cooking blog for more recipes go and check it out!

This is a tasty casserole or side dish made with those inevitable monster zucchinis!

Cut away the seeds on each piece, leaving about 3/8 inch of the white flesh.

Then cut the strips into small pieces like this.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan over medium-high heat.  Then add the zucchini and saute 2-3 minutes.

Beat the eggs with the 1/2 cup coarsely grated Parmesan.

Bake 35-45 minutes or until the mixture is well set and lightly browned on top.  Serve hot.

Monster Zucchini and Basil Strata
(Makes 8 servings, recipe created by Kalyn with inspiration from a blog that no longer exists.)

Ingredients:
1 monster zucchini, 14-16 inches long
(or use several smaller ones but don’t cut out seeds and saute for a shorter time)
2 T olive oil
1-2 tsp. Spike Seasoning
(or use any all-purpose seasoning that’s good on vegetables)
salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup chopped fresh basil
3/4 cup grated Mozzarella cheese (I used low-fat Mozzarella)
6 eggs
2 T milk, half and half, or cream (I used 2% milk)

1/2 cup + 1/2 cup coarsely grated Parmesan or Asiago  (If you only have finely grated Parmesan I would use a little less)

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400F/200C.  Use a 10 X 12 glass casserole dish for this and spray with olive oil or nonstick spray.

Wash zucchini, then cut off ends and cut in half crosswise to get manageable sized pieces.  Cut each half into fourths (or sixths) lengthwise. Use a spoon or small knife to scrape away the seeds and most of the white inside, leaving about 3/8 inch of white attached to the skin. Then cut each strip crosswise into pieces about 3/8 inch wide.

Heat olive oil in large nonstick frying pan, add zucchini and saute 2-3 minutes over medium-high heat. Add Spike and fresh basil and saute 2-3 minutes more, seasoning the zucchini with salt and fresh ground black pepper. (Zucchini should be barely starting to soften.)

Put zucchini into casserole dish with the Mozzarella cheese.  Combine eggs, milk, and 1/2 cup coarsely grated Parmesan or Asiago and beat well. Pour egg mixture over zucchini and cheese and gently stir so it’s well combined, with some zucchini pieces “peeking” out of the egg. Sprinkle the other 1/2 cup Parmesan or Asiago over top.

Bake 35-45 minutes, or until the mixture is well set and slightly browned on top.  Serve hot.

The flavors in this dish are similar to Easy Cheesy Zucchini Bake, which is the recipe I would probably use if I had regular-sized zucchini.

South Beach Suggestions:
With low-fat mozzarella and milk, this recipe would be a good side dish or main dish for any phase of the South Beach Diet or any type of low-glycemic eating plan.  As a main dish, I’d pair this with something like a Perfect Lettuce Salad or Mediterranean Salad with Hummus Dressing.

Technorati Tags: healthy recipes, kalyns kitchen, zucchini and basil

The whitecoats say you have allergies, asthma, sleep apnea, depression, chronic fatigue, GERD and fibromyalgia. They say you’ll be on a dozen different medications for the rest of your life. But what does the doctor looking back at you in the mirror say?

The doctor in the mirror says you have an innate wisdom inside, capable of RECREATING a healthier version you. A ‘you’ without allergies, asthma, sleep apnea, depression, chronic fatigue, GERD or fibromyalgia. That doctor is just waiting for you to remove the roadblock.

Health is your birthright. Health is your natural state. Health is what you get when you have a clear nerve system. Don’t be imprisoned by the whitecoat’s diagnosis, it’s merely a temporary state. Find a Chiropractor who works for the doctor inside of you and you’ll leave sickness and dis-ease behind in the dust.

The Weekly Sticky

Technorati Tags: Chiropractic, chiropractor

Chiropractic Health Update:

The FDA has issued a proposed mandate that represents the greatest threat to dietary supplements since 1994. Back in the early 1990s, consumers were so alarmed by FDA bullying that they staged a massive revolt. The result was that Congress passed a law prohibiting the FDA from banning popular nutrients (as the agency had threatened to do).

There was, however, a loophole in the 1994 law. The FDA was given authority to regulate ingredients introduced after October 15, 1994.

It has been 17 years, but the FDA just issued draconian proposals as to how it intends to regulate what it now calls “new dietary ingredients”. You can find the FDA Draft Guidance on New Dietary Ingredients (NDI’s) here. If implemented, some of the most effective nutrients you are taking will be removed from the market. This includes many fish oil formulas and natural plant extracts. A detailed analysis of the FDA Draft Guidance is available here.

These oppressive rules are exactly what the 1994 law (DSHEA) sought to prevent. The FDA is using its authority in direct violation of Congressional intent.

In order for these ingredients you are using today to return to the market, the FDA will require manufacturers to conduct outrageously expensive studies using absurdly high doses, in some situations multiplied by a “safety factor” up to 2,000-times the recommended dosage on a per product basis.

The FDA defines dietary supplements as being “new” if they were introduced after October 15, 1994. That means that even certain nutrients that have been safely used over the course of three decades will be subject to the FDA’s oppressive policies that mandate costly animal testing.

The FDA Views Supplements in Same Light as Synthetic Food Preservatives

According to the new guidelines, the FDA believes that “new dietary supplements” must be regulated similarly to synthetic food preservatives. The FDA guidelines have modeled the outrageous safety thresholds after those in place for food additives. This appears to be in direct violation of DSHEA, the law enacted in 1994 to protect consumer access to dietary supplements, which classifies dietary supplements as foods, not food additives.

The FDA proposes that new dietary supplement ingredients should adhere to aggressive safety margins, which are typically reserved for chemical compounds known to be dangerous in all but the most miniscule concentrations.

Since food additives or preservatives such as aspartame, monosodium glutamate, and sodium nitrate are known to cause cancer or other severe health problems, the FDA has implemented safety guidelines which limit allowable concentrations of these food additives to levels that are supposed to be physiologically inert.

The fact that the FDA is trying to impose the same limits upon dietary supplements seems to be arbitrary and completely unfounded. In fact, when someone takes a dietary supplement, their intent is to positively affect the structure or function of their bodies in some way – limiting dosages of dietary supplements to physiologically inert levels defeats the entire purpose of supplementation with health-sustaining nutrients.

The FDA’s new guidelines are so flawed that even nutrients shown to be completely safe in hundreds of human clinical studies would fail to accommodate the unreasonable safety margins.

To give you an example, each manufacturer of certain fish oils would have to conduct a one year study where animals would have to consume the human equivalent of 240,000 milligrams each day of fish oil.

Another option under the FDA’s proposed mandates is to conduct a 90-day, 1,000 – fold safety margin study in which two species of animals, one being non-rodent – likely young beagle dogs, will theoretically consume the equivalent of 2.4 million milligrams of fish oil daily. We know of virtually no species can tolerate this high dose, so by default, FDA guidelines will make it impossible for certain omega-3 supplements to be sold. (Note typical dose of EPA/DHA people take each day is around 2,400 mg—100 times less than what the FDA proposes must be tested.)

Since these are not patented drugs, no supplement maker will be able to afford these “safety” studies, which means that many of the nutrients you now purchase at low prices will convert into high-priced drugs.

Pharmaceutical Industry Profit Threatened By Low Cost Supplements

It appears that the FDA is claiming that dietary supplements are unsafe, and in order to “protect consumers” the agency must place a stranglehold on the dietary supplement industry by requesting exorbitant safety testing. These ludicrous safety thresholds are in excess of those required by pharmaceutical drugs despite studies showing supplements are far safer than drugs.

According to the 2001 report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers (AAPCC), of the substances implicated in fatal poisonings in 2001, 84.6 percent were pharmaceutical drugs, with analgesics being implicated as the primary cause of death in 32 percent of fatalities or 341 deaths. This compares with 0.8 percent for all dietary supplements combined, even including substances such as dinitrophenol, a dangerous (and illegal) substance banned in 1938, as well as the central nervous system stimulant Ma Huang (Ephedra). Interestingly, the anti-asthma drug theophylline alone was responsible for 15 deaths, 66 percent more than all the available dietary supplements combined.

There is, however, a massive economic benefit for the drug industry if the proposed guidelines are enforced by the FDA. Health conscious Americans who properly supplement slash their risk of degenerative disease. The FDA’s new rules, if enacted, will force the price of many supplements to surge upwards, while removing many effective ones altogether. That means that more aging people will have to rely on side effect laden prescription drugs to treat the degenerative diseases they will contract because they will be denied access to health-promoting nutrients.

What You Can Do to Stop this Impending Carnage!

No one can sit on the sidelines with an emergency of this magnitude about to befall everyone who depends on dietary supplements. As citizens, we have the constitutional right to petition the government to redress our grievances. In this case, the FDA proposals pose a direct threat to our health and longevity.

We therefore have to take extraordinary measures to defend our right to continue using supplements that our very lives depend on, and to gain access to new natural ingredients that demonstrate efficacy in scientific studies.

I ask each one of you contact your representatives by following this link:

Recall how Consumers revolted back in 1994 and the result was a glorious victory over FDA tyranny!

Let your voice be heard by exercising your right to petition the government against these serious violations of the law and scientific principle. Please be sure to call, fax, or send a certified letter to your representative – emails can be easily dismissed.

Here is a set of talking points for your consideration:

• My name is [Name] and I am a constituent of [Congress Member's name].
• I am very concerned about the new FDA draft guidance on dietary supplements and new dietary ingredients.
• I request that Congress hold hearings and take action to review the FDA’s draft guidance and stop their overreach of power.
• The FDA’s draft guidance flies in the face of the original congressional intent of the Dietary Supplement Health Education Act: The guidance turns what was meant to be a simple notification system for new dietary ingredients into a preapproval scheme that Congress did not intend to create.
• Congress recognized that dietary supplements are natural ingredients and therefore inherently safer than drugs and chemical food ingredients. It did not intend that the FDA would have the power to approve or reject dietary supplements.
• The FDA’s draft guidance creates unnecessary regulations that limit my access to dietary supplements I rely on. The expensive and burdensome process will force between 20,000 and 42,000 dietary supplements to be removed from the market and will increase the cost of those supplements that remain.
• The draft guidance hurts our economy. Expert analyses show that this guidance will cause a total economic loss of $21.2 billion to $39.8 billion annually.
• Thank you for your time.

Tips:

• Be courteous and respectful.
• Keep your comments brief and focused on the facts.
• Always thank the staff member for their time taking your call.

by: Dr. Joseph Mercola at www.mercola.com

Technorati Tags: Chiropractic, FDA, Supplement ban

by mally at totalnoms.com

The nice thing about this dish (and a lot of other quinoa based dishes, like this one) is that it’s super easy to prepare, and doesn’t require a ton of pots and pans. In fact, this dish is one of those one-pot classics!

Curried Quinoa Salad with Mango

From AllRecipes

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups chicken stock (can use vegetable stock if you want to make this vegetarian)
• 3/4 cup quinoa
• 1 1/2 teaspoons curry powder
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 mango – peeled, seeded and diced
• 3 green onions, chopped

Directions

Bring chicken stock, quinoa, curry powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper to a boil in a saucepan over high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until the quinoa is tender, anywhere from 15-25 minutes- so keep checking. Once done, scrape the quinoa into a shallow dish and allow to cool to room temperature. Stir in the mango and green onions. Serve either at room temperature or cold.

Chiropractor Weekly Sticky:

What would you do if your car’s low oil light came on today? Would you top off your engine with some 10W-30 weight or put some black tape over that little annoying light so you wouldn’t have to deal with it any more?

Ignoring the warning sign will cause your engine to seize down the road. And if you were checking the dipstick regularly and adding oil when needed, the light might not have come on in the first place. The same goes for your spine and regular Chiropractic check ups.

When your spine gets too low on adjustments, pain is the warning light. Unfortunately by the time the pain shows up you’ve been out of adjustment too long. If that’s the case, don’t ‘black tape’ the pain with Tylenol or any other pain killer for that matter. Bring your spine in for a proper Chiropractic Adjustment today and avoid a catastrophic seize event tomorrow.

Thanks to our friends at The Weekly Sticky for the great analogies.